


Heir to the King

by Corvus_no_Genmu



Category: Godzilla - All Media Types, Godzilla - Fandom, 僕のヒーローアカデミア | Boku no Hero Academia | My Hero Academia
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Boku no Hero Academia | My Hero Academia Manga Spoilers, Crossover, Daikaiju, F/M, Gen, Heroes & Heroines, Kaiju, Meddling Kids, Monsters, Nomu - Freeform, Quirks (My Hero Academia), Science Fiction, Self-Insert, Titans
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-15
Updated: 2020-07-16
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:13:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 57,922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22656823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Corvus_no_Genmu/pseuds/Corvus_no_Genmu
Summary: Armed with memories of a world once perceived as little more than fiction and a Quirk unlike anything this fantastical world has ever seen before... There can be no other course than to bring an end to the greater evils to come before they have the chance to rise.But when the road ahead of him is not the familiar path he knows, Itsuki Marumaru will soon realize that while the Golden Age of Heroes is coming to an end… a new era is on the rise…Now with TV Tropes page!
Comments: 5
Kudos: 64





	1. EPISODE 0.0: Animal I Have Become

_I can’t escape this hell…  
So many times I’ve tried but I’m still caged inside…  
Somebody get me through this nightmare…  
I can’t control myself…_

  
What is the difference between Destiny and Fate? Some would say that there is hardly any difference at all, that the connotations of the words themselves is what defines any boundaries between them. That “fate” is a word synonymous with “fight” and thus is a constant struggle to avoid at any cost. In contrast to its twin, “destiny” is accepted as something that should not be only be accepted but welcomed with open arms. Many are those who believe that the two cannot be broken or avoided for long, unaware that the supposed solidity is in fact quite fragile. Likely finely crafted glass, all that it takes is the softest touch to shatter fate and destiny alike.  
  
Or in more simplistic terms, all it takes is a choice.  
  
Go left instead of right. Wears shoes instead of sandals. Every action has a consequence big or small and as the saying goes, all it takes is a butterfly flapping its wings to give rise to a hurricane on the opposite side of the world.  
  
In this particular circumstance, it was a Quirk.  
  
A Quirk that in another time and another place would never have been used let alone recognized for what it was. In every possibility that existed throughout the multiverse, there was little to no change of the inevitable outcome for this Quirk and its user. First and foremost, the user would die, the cost of their power too high for they possessed neither the strength nor the experience to comprehend the scale of their meta-ability. As to what the Quirk itself could do, well, in most circumstances it did absolutely nothing as those whom were struck by its effects were freshly bought canvases before its great and terrible power. Blank and empty, thus unrealized.  
  
Each and every time in countless iterations of this branch of Infinity, this event occurred over and over and over again, the sheer number immeasurable by the human scale.  
  
Save for one.  
  
Because no matter how impossible, how utterly improbable, there is always a chance and thus forever a choice. Left when they would have gone right, traveling down a path so much the same and yet so remarkably different than what might have been. To end up at the wrong place at exactly the right time and there you have it.  
  
A butterfly’s wings had flapped…  
  
And a hurricane of change was born.  
  


* * *

Izuku Midoriya was four years old when he learned that not all men are created equal. That no matter the strength of one’s convictions, the strength of their Quirk was what made them a true force to be reckoned with. Weeks after he had been told point blank that he did not nor would he ever have a Quirk, he turned to his mother, tears in his eyes, asking if he could still be a hero regardless, the only answer he received was a sorrowful apology and not the answer he wanted to hear…  
  
It was on the very day he turned five when someone finally started to tell him something else. Not directly in words or in action but in something more simplistic and frankly rather befuddling to the young boy.  
  
Contrary to his hopes, neither Kacchan nor his own father made an appearance at his birthday this year though the latter at least sent a humble birthday card and a gift from the States. Another figure of All Might, much like the one that Izuku carried with him everywhere but different in that it spoke the fascinating language of English, was dressed in his very first costume, and he was getting sidetracked again!  
  
Izuku shook his head firmly and looked once more to the package sitting next to his father’s opened one. There was no return address and while it correctly had his home address, or so his mom assured him despite his concerns that it was meant for someone else, the name scrawled besides his own was “The Ninth.”  
  
The ninth what, the young boy had no idea and had even less when he opened the package up to see what it contained.  
  
A small wooden plaque upon which was carved: _It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare, but because we do not dare that things are difficult._ In the bottom corner was a small baby bunny peaking out from tall reeds of grass. Beneath it and carefully wrapped in soft paper was an All Might pen set and a rather humble looking notebook. The title on the notebook’s cover was blank save for a tiny little sticker at the bottom corner, one that depicted a chibi rendition of All Might with a hand held up in victory and a speech bubble exclaiming “ _You can do it!_ ”  
  
Young Izuku appreciated the gifts, particularly the pens that he made sure to clean before and after every use for years to come, but he couldn’t figure out who had given them to him or why. As the years passed by, the gifts kept coming without fail on his birthday and Izuku started noticing a trend of sorts between them.  
  
There was always something that was clearly handmade and bore some manner of moral or words of encouragement upon them or in little typed notes packaged with them. Most of them were carefully carved plaques of wood bearing caricatures of rabbits or extra fluffy lambs. He especially liked the quilt that had been done in All Might’s thematic colors and all but wore it as a cape during the following winter.  
  
Aside from the handmade gifts, there was always something store bought and easily found on a shelf at some store though it wouldn’t be until his first year in middle school that Izuku found one. He had made such a scene that his mother had almost scolded him for it until he shakily pointed out the very camera he had received for his last birthday and the price tag with its many, _many_ numbers.  
  
Needless to say, his mother’s reaction put his own to shame though for an entirely different reason.  
  
Yet, for how (scary!) expensive a lot of those gifts were, they too followed a certain pattern. One that only helped Izuku in his steadily growing hobby of cataloging each and every Hero and Quirk he could lay his eyes upon. From high definition photographs to equally high quality video capture, Izuku swiftly found himself filling whole _scrapbooks_ of information down.  
  
It never truly hit Izuku until he at last heard the words spoken aloud to him by his own personal hero All Might. Hit him as solidly as a Detroit Smash directly to the face that the very hero who was his inspiration for all of his young life was not the first to believe in him but the _second_.  
  
That summer, when his fifteenth birthday came on a day of blood, sweat, and far more tears than a human body ought to contain, Izuku found an anonymous package awaiting him once more and again found himself at a loss of what they could mean.  
  
The first was a figurine, tiny and small, of a young squire boy freshly dressed for a long journey ahead and armed with a simple, if not positively _gleaming_ golden sword held aloft in its grasp. The figure’s head was turned to look back over his shoulders with its eyes alight with determination but sporting a shining smile on his face. The fact that the little squire boy was a picture perfect copy of Izuku himself did not escape him.  
  
The second gift was a pair of thick gloves; the kind he was certain only Pro-Heroes could afford. The gloves bore a pair of words stitched onto the back “Plus” on the left and “ULTRA!” on the right. Izuku tried them on and wasn’t surprised to find them a perfect fit when his eyes spotted a small note in the bottom of the box.  
  
 _See you soon, Number Nine._  
  


* * *

The sun was hours away still from rising on the distant horizon when they had arrived at the former trash heap now almost completely restored into a prestigious beach with crystal clear waves lapping at the gorgeous white sands of the shore. The source of the beach’s rejuvenation was still hard at work, mere hours away from ridding the beach of its last scrap of garbage and a lone spectator stood far and out of sight of the diligently working boy, each regarding him in silent contemplation.  
  
Though the boy was only a few months older than the one currently cleaning the former trash heap of a beach, the difference between them was almost as great as the day from the night. For one, this boy was tall, easily pushing seven-and-a-half feet in all and while he was slim in musculature there was a bit of gauntness to him as well, as though he were half-starved. His hair, a resplendent gold even in the wee hours of the morning, was brushed back along his head and fell down in spiky waves to the nape of his neck.  
  
He was dressed in well-worn clothing, a pair of jeans with patchwork knees, a red t-shirt that was at best a decade or three old, and a jacket that went out of style back in the late twentieth century never-mind previous resurgences in this one. His shoes were a pair of mismatched customized Nikes made special for one whose feet did not fit the human standard. A pair of long, serpentine tails each slightly longer than he is tall, swayed in the air behind him, their clubbed tips glistening sharply with the barely sheathed spikes that adorned them.  
  
He was not entirely Japanese despite what his name might imply but in a world where even the most benign of physical mutations resulted in hair colors ranging from the plain to the absurd, such details were of a minor inconvenience at best. Even in the darkened hours of a predawn sun, his distorted eyes of yellow pupils against crimson sclera seemed to almost shine as he stared down at the slightly younger boy working so diligently on the once trash-ridden beach.  
  
His name is Itsuki Marumaru and he is impressed.  
  
 _… Is he actually trying to pull that car to the top of the pile? Is he that focused on moving it off the beach that he hasn’t noticed what he’s trying to—Ah, I suppose succeeding is a more accurate statement…_ He squinted, eyes gaining a faint golden sheen. He chuckled, closing his eyes and shaking his head, smiling and revealing a larger than normal amount of sharpened canines. _So that’s what it is… A bit of A and a whole lot of B…_ **BS more like…**  
  
He turned away from the beach and started making his way to the parking lot and down the sidewalk just as an ancient pickup truck came turning down the furthest corner. He paused, eyes flashing red for a moment but in the end, kept walking forward.


	2. EPISODE 1.0: You Know My Name

_If you take a life do you know what you'll give? Odds are, you won't like what it is…  
When the storm arrives, would you be seen with me?  
By the merciless eyes I've deceived?_

  
Itsuki Marumaru looked up at Yuuei, his face an expressionless mask as he took in the massive high school that could, and frankly did, put most college campuses to shame in sheer size alone. He was alone save for the other early morning arrivals slowly making their way to the testing auditorium inside the building proper. They ignored his lingering presence with ease born of centuries long practice to ignore that what didn’t fit into the common standard.

His physical appearance aside, Itsuki did not paint a pleasant picture that could, optimistically, be called “down on his luck” by the more kindhearted. They at least presumed he was overwhelmed at the sight of a school where many heroes had once stood before, including the likes of the Symbol of Peace himself.

Those of more pricklier spirits and mindsets, well they thought him overwhelmed at the sheer impossibility standing before him. Itsuki clearly could only just afford this long glance at the building so why not milk it for all that it was worth?

In truth, such thoughts of heroes past or monetary issues at present never once crossed Itsuki’s mind as he stood before Yuuei. No, what kept him trapped in a rapturous gaze was his mind trying to separate the reality of the school building from the memories of illustrations and background scenery of an anime Itsuki himself had never seen.

Even now, after so many years… When That One’s memories had nearly driven Itsuki to madness… it was so _surreal_ … To see things and know them with absolute certainty to be both well and truly real as well as a complete and utter work of fiction. Fantastically well conceived and beloved fiction but fiction all the same. Fiction that Itsuki also knew was actual fact and truthful history no matter what details or snippets were left to interpretation or imagination.

Itsuki shook his head, stopping that train of thought before it could gather steam. Without further thought of consequences and what-could-have-been, he made his way inside.

* * *

Time seemed to slow to a crawl as Itsuki sat amongst a veritable mob of hopeful applicants, all having finished the written portion of the exam some time ago. In that regard, Itsuki was certain a portion of his overall grade would suffer not because he felt he had answered incorrectly but rather that he had answered too much.

In his defense, he had not expected the last portion of the written exam to be an essay question that touched upon morality. Specifically one that presented a scenario of a villain committing a crime and how he, a hero on scene, would respond to the situation. Itsuki had barely finished writing the last sentence in time and even now, an hour and a light meal later, his hand was still aching from how fervently he had written his answer. He had dedicated every spare micrometer he could in giving reason behind his choice of action and inaction, with more than a few sentences dedicated to the lack of reasonability and coherency of modern laws and Quirks.

 _Frankly, the question was too open-ended, too lacking in any fine detail beyond the current situation and how to resolve it, caring little for the motivation of the villain just that they were such and needed to be stopped._ Itsuki waited impatiently as Present Mic laid out the rules and regulations of the practical portion of the entrance exams.

Even sitting in the furthest corner of the vast auditorium, the man’s voice carried like a shrill screech in Itsuki’s ears. His claws were starting to make some fairly deep gouges into the wooden armrest of his chair with every new word out of the blonde-haired Hero’s mouth. Those sitting near him choose not to comment though they did make a point to slide further away, especially when the bladed tips of his tails started to unsheathe with a small, metallic hiss.

Eventually, though what felt more like an eternity, they were dismissed to their respected battle centers and Itsuki found an empty space in front of the doors leading into Battle Center G and began a small routine of stretches. He ignored the looks aimed towards him, the stares and the glares alike.

Like the other participants, Itsuki had forgone his daytime attire in place of a pair of sweatpants and bare feet alongside an equally bare chest. Many of the nearby hopefuls were eying him, whispering among themselves at the possibility of his Quirk and how someone so clearly starved and down-on-his-luck could dare to present themselves before a school so prestigious as U.A. High and think themselves acceptable.

Itsuki didn’t pay them any mind, even those whom he recognized from That One’s memories. Instead, he kept his attention on the doors thus was unsurprised to see them opening with nary a sound.

The destructive explosion of concrete beneath his feet heralded his entrance into the battleground and sent his observers stumbling in surprise. In a single leap, he managed to cover a whole block and landed feet first against an unprepared one-pointer, crushing it beneath his enlarged girth. Now fourteen feet tall with a toughened hide of thick reptilian scales of golden splendor that easily tanked the rubber bullets of the three-pointer in front of him.

His head had now become an amalgamation of human and dragon, face pressed outwards in a gaping snarl of fangs and five pairs of curved horns erupting at the back of his now hairless skull. His neck had elongated slightly, just above a swan’s in length while his arms were now long and thin, bony fingers nearly touching the cemented ground beneath his feet. Itsuki’s twin tails had grown in length as well but were otherwise unchanged save the bony spikes at their tips possessing a distinctly metallic sheen.

His throat glowed before with golden light before Itsuki’s mouth opened wide and loosed a thunderbolt that sent the three-pointer flying into its fellow machines with an explosive crash of shrapnel. His reptilian lips drew back further, fully exposing his fangs in a primal display. Beneath his golden scales, Itsuki’s blood was pumping hot and hard in his veins, a flicker of electricity coursing through them like ravenous serpents as the sparkling machine trembled and died beneath his claws.

 _That’s fourteen points._ **Not enough. Don’t stop. Keep moving.**

* * *

Three days after the exam and well into the afternoon of the fourth and the U.A. faculty were still going the many applicants to the hero course. A surprisingly large number had passed the written portion of the exams and with more than a few heated… discussions… having broken out over some applicants over their performance in the practical… Well was it any wonder that they had only just now gotten to those in Battleground G?

“So what did you think of that examinee, Shota-kun?”

It was nearing the end of what felt like an extremely long day to a majority of the teachers save for one whom felt it was the end of a week of nothing but pain, torment, and a hell of a lot of misery. Only when he took another long sip of his coffee did Shota Aizawa find the strength to answer. Given that his choice of drink for this day was, in his own opinion, black as his embittered soul, it was this rare but oh so precious drink that made this yearly affair even remotely bearable for the underground hero.

Still in a lot of pain and definitely some torment. Misery?

“Meh.”

Having heard this answer for every question that he had asked the Underground Hero, Shota’s self-proclaimed bosom buddy Hizashi Yamada felt his ever present smile twitch in the opposite direction and Nemuri Kayama, recognizing an imminent sign of the End Times, hastily brought up the next set of recordings.

“Examinee No.: 1964, Itsuki Marumaru.” Nemuri brought up the boy’s middle school picture on the center screen whilst the rest brought up paused videos taken from the multitude of cameras littered throughout the false cityscape. “Quirk…” She blinked and pressed her small, red reading glasses further up her nose to make sure her eyes weren’t deceiving her. “Yes.”

“… Wait, what?” asked No. 13 with a small laugh while Shota groaned and took another long drink of his coffee, dark and empty as his heart.

Snipe guffawed. “Ya’ll are kiddin’, right? He actually wrote that?”

Sekijiro Kan rolled his eyes. “At least it’s a better answer than what that one candidate wrote under sex.”

“[Yes please!]” giggled Hizashi under his breath in English, which pretty much meant that everyone in the room heard him clear as day and just as easily ignored him for it. Shota contemplated ways of murdering him via vicious application of his coffee mug up the blonde’s nose only to think better of it. The underground hero would have nothing from which to drink his pitch-black coffee if he did that and silence —sweet blessed silence— was not worth the sacrifice of this most abysmally darkened cup of java.

“Marumaru…” Toshinori Yagi tapped his bony chin in thought. “Wouldn’t that mean he’s…?”

“Indeed he is but such a thing hasn’t stopped him so far.” Nezu answered, sitting back in his plush chair, little paws clasping together in front of his snout as he watched the recordings play out. Barely a few minutes in and already he was starting to put the pieces together and though his jovial façade never faltered, there was a predatory steeliness in his gaze. _Interesting…_ “Thoughts Aizawa-san?”

Shota repressed the urge to default to his standard answer for the last several candidates and easily ignored Hizashi unabashedly learning forward excitedly with an extremely wide grin on his smug face. “He’s ambitious but ambition doesn’t make a hero, only reckless idiots. They see the end goal and how to achieve it as quickly as possible without any thought or concern for the consequences.”

“Ambitious? Hell, hard to argue that. He’s gone and gotten da most villain points out o’ the ‘ole lot with plenty o’ time still left to spare,” said Snipe, tallying the number of robots Itsuki was destroying on the screens.

“Aye, and stealing a lot of them from his fellow applicants to boot.” Sekijiro noted with a small frown as the video displayed Itsuki charging in and crashing horned head first into a small horde of robots before any of the other applicants could so much as blink in stunned surprise.

“I was wondering why Battleground G had so much more wreckage compared to the other areas…” muttered Higari Maijima, metal-tipped fingers tapping agitatedly on the armrest of his chair. “At least the first years in the Support course will have plenty of scrap to work with this year…”

“True, true,” agreed Nezu. “Young Marumaru is certainly ambitious as any examinee would be but not to the degree you think, Shota-kun, Sekijiro-kun. Look. Pay attention not to what he’s doing but _why_ he’s doing it.”

The faculty exchanged confused looks but paid closer attention than they had been, trying to see what it was that their pint-sized principal had spotted before when they were watching the examinees live.

“He’s targeting the larger threats.” Ryo Inui murmured, leaning forward in his chair, clawed hand reaching up to cup the muzzle strapped to his snout. “He’s not going after the three-pointers for the points, it’s because he sees them as a more active threat compared to the one and two pointers.”

“Given that he’s destroyed a bunch of one-pointers simply from stepping on them that’s kind of an understatement I think,” said Hizashi with a smile.

“Yes, yes, but look at that, right there.” No. 13 pointed at the monitor that displayed Itsuki standing between a three-pointer and a horde of students caught by surprise at its sudden emergence from a nearby building, arms spread wide as he advanced on the machine. “He’s making himself the bigger target, drawing the shots aimed at those unprepared or unable to defend themselves.”

“Heh, no shortage of rescue points either then, yeah?” Snipe chuckled.

Nezu nodded and looked at the timestamp at the upper corners of the recordings. “Indeed but that’s not all. Look… There! Do you see what I see?”

They looked and saw Marumaru suddenly straighten, neck twisting to look one direction before his head twitched towards the left then the right before he suddenly turned around. He stood facing the end of the street where the massive zero-pointer was only just starting to arise from its hidden compartment with fangs bared and claws at the ready.

“Wait, replay that.” Ectoplasm leaned forward as Nemuri did so. His eyes narrowed. “Well, well, well… He’s looking in the direction of the other battlegrounds isn’t he? He’s somehow sensing the zero-pointers emerging before the one in his area shows up.”

Snipe whistled. “Boy howdy… He’s got a bit o’ precognition in him don’t he?”

“It’s hardly surprising. Most transformation Quirks result in a wider range of senses than the human norm,” said Ken Ishiyama, frowning thoughtfully and tapping a squared finger to his nonexistent chin. “Especially those of _that_ variety…”

“Indeed, indeed, quite the variety indeed,” said Nezu with a smile. “I think that Marumaru-kun will continue to surprise us!”

* * *

“Gods damn it!”

Even forewarned by That One’s knowledge, Itsuki was still an extreme bundle of tightly strung nerves long before actually receiving the letter from Yuuei. Having All Might suddenly appear in his home via holographic projection, twice as bright and loud as he was in person no less, did not help him any. As it was, he’d need to go dumpster diving for another chair again and scrounge about for some more wood for the ceiling.

Again.

Quickly dusting off his head as he shrunk down to his more humanoid form, Itsuki Marumaru picked himself off the floor of his humble abode and tried to not stare too hard at the image of a beaming All Might dressed in a rather gaudy yellow suit. Really, the man could, and hopefully would if That One’s Recollections were any indication, dress in far better attire than that in the future. The Symbol of Peace spoke of Itsuki’s performance in the exam, the unorthodox answer that he gave in the essay portion of the written exam that sparked a fierce debate amongst the faculty, and for the practical—

 _“You scored amongst the highest in villain points in the practical portion of the entrance exam, Young Marumaru! Not that you were lacking in another, far more important, aspect of being a hero though!”_

The clip that showcased the highlights of his performance consisted mostly of how he had done in the early on in the exam. How Itsuki had quickly overtaken the pack of examinees and the devastation of his methodology when eliminating his enemies. Seeing it from the outside elicited a strange sense of déjà vu though it was not Itsuki himself that knew why. **It’s just like…**

Then came the zero-pointer.

Itsuki leaned forward, clawed fingers clenching tightly upon his knees. He watched as his past self took a hesitant step back against an overwhelming force, the fear and trepidation clear even on a draconian visage and then… Then his past-self’s eyes flashed gold for the tiniest moment, too fast to be spotted even when he was actively looking for it, and his past-self’s eyes moved down towards the zero-pointer’s massive treads.

The video changed perspective, showing the cloud of dust flowing outwards from the encroaching zero-pointer like a veritable tsunami and there, formerly lying invisibly and unnoticed by all but the sharpest of senses, an unconscious girl lay, a vague shape lost in the growing fog of debris. A moment passed, the tread getting dangerously close only for it and the rest of the zero-pointer’s massive body to suddenly be brought to a grounding halt.

Another angle, one aimed downwards from atop a nearby skyscraper showed the cause. Itsuki stood before the zero-pointer, claws digging deeply into its armored body as his feet dug a slow trench in the asphalt beneath him. His body was growing, already twenty feet tall and changing more and more. His neck became more serpentine and a growth of spikes erupted around his clavicles, eerily reminiscent to the same horns that adorned his head. His arms grew to ridiculous lengths, stretching thinner and yet somehow became stronger as thin membrane sprung unseen between his imbedded and now elongated fingers.

Itsuki flinched, rubbing his left arm as the phantom pains of holding back the transformation in his arms whilst the rest of him was changed had hurt far more than he had realized. _A few more months,_ he reassured himself, _and then there’ll be no holding back._ **Then we can make our power known.**

His pants were tearing apart along the legs but managed to not tear asunder completely. Lightning danced along his tightly gritting fangs and the muscles of his arms were bulging from the strain of holding back both the massive machine and completing the transformation. His past self was slowing the massive machine down but he alone wasn’t enough to stop its advance.

 _“A true hero is an inspiration for others to follow in their example and you certainly were that Young Higuchi! Your actions earned you and your comrades a lot of rescue points!”_

Thick, thorny vines ensnared the dreadful treads from the ground while long strips of tape flew through the air from on high, binding the massive limbs tightly to a massive torso. A girl with a frog’s tongue ensnared the unconscious examinee and whisked her away. Only when his fellow examinees were out of the way did Itsuki finally act.

With a ferocious roar, Itsuki’s head lunged forward, jaws clamping tightly over steel as lightning erupted upwards from his throat and into the gargantuan machine with explosive force, toppling the robot back just enough for gravity to pick up the slack. The zero-pointer fell with a massive, earth trembling crash.

Almost mirroring his draconic reflection on the video, Itsuki had a pleased and slightly vindictive sneer on his face at the sight.

The screen cut back to a beaming All Might, hand held up in a congratulatory thumbs-up. _“However, don’t consider this the crowning moment of your career, Young Marumaru! This is merely the prologue, the first step, of your story, your journey! This is the start of your hero academia!”_

Itsuki loosed a breath he didn’t know he was holding.

He had done it.

He was in the hero course and —according to the paperwork he had received— he was now a part of Class 1-A and—

“Oh…” **Oh shit.**

He was in Class 1-A.

Surrounded on all sides by people that That One knew and by default so too did Itsuki. People whom he had only seen in passing at the exam, had never spoken more than a few words to at best, and yet knew them explicitly in ways that no stranger should ever know. Classmates and peers that he’d have to pretend and acknowledge as little more than strangers and novices than the pros he knew that they would become.

“Gods damn it.” He fell back onto his sleeping bag and looking up at the cobweb-ridden rafters of his current home. It was another unfamiliar ceiling finely aged with dust and the tangled skeins of spiders, just one of the many forgotten warehouses left to rot in the Arkanis district. Far from the first warehouse that Itsuki had come to call home, this latest one at least was far enough away from the seedier parts of the city to warrant any wannabe villains scoping it for a potential hideout or a well-meaning but far too overbearing hero trying to do what they thought was the right thing.

Just another day for a guy who had spent the better part of ten years trying to make sense of the life he inexplicably found himself living. The future was already tremulous and if certain events were to play out exactly as they had from what That One had seen… **This is the only chance, the only way to change things.**

Too many lives were at stake. **They’ll forgive this. They have to.**

They’ll forgive him. They must.


	3. EPISODE 2.0: Number One

_Be the focus of attention. Be the name that every one must mention.  
Come out from the shadows, it's your time, cause tonight is the night for everyone to see…_

  
Toshinori Yagi was a secretive man by practice, never really revealing the full truth to anyone but a select and precious few and even then not without being dragged into it kicking and screaming which, if one were to have met his first year’s homeroom teacher, was an understandable and extremely justified reaction. He could count on one hand the number of people who knew him by his actual name and fewer still whom knew such personal details as his name and place of residence.

So one can imagine then, the complete and utter shock he felt when he found a package awaiting him on the front step of his house mere hours after being dismissed from the hospital and Recovery Girl’s care to further recuperate in the privacy of his home.

After careful consideration and mild experimentation, which is to say carefully looking over the package and lightly poking it with one of his crutches, Toshinori brought it inside his home and opened it thinking it some manner of gift, or prank even, from those few who actually knew where resided. Its contents consisted of a guidebook to those recovering from a gastrectomy and boxed samples of the appropriate foodstuffs and drinks. Between the pages of the book there was a printed note that wished for him to please be well and…

_Don’t worry, you will find a worthy successor to carry the torch._

Those words… Only a select number knew of the truth of his Quirk and they had spoken long, hard, and heatedly with him about it already. They would not waste time with such words again delivered in such a way as this.

So he had moved to a new house swiftly as he could and while he did at least keep the book, he couldn’t really bring himself to stomach the food. Aside from the possibility of being poisoned (slim though it might be), it was still settling into his mind that a great many things he had taken for granted were now forever lost to him.

Toshinori was man enough to admit that he wept at the thought of never being able to consume a triple quarter pounder with extra cheese ever again.

Didn’t stop him from doing ads in place of the long, and frankly best, forgotten clown though.

The months passed by and another care package found its way to him on the day of his birth. Its contents several different packages of seeds along with another printed note: _Lies told to avoid trouble usually make more._ _A true friend stays true through good times and bad._

At the bottom of the page, a picture was taped. A picture carefully cut out of a magazine from halfway across the world. Toshinori had stared at the picture for a long time, before his gaze went to the packets of seeds. Well, his new backyard had a considerable amount of space for a vegetable garden…

He ignored the contents of the note and continued to do so for every new one that arrived every few months for the next five years. Or at least, he tried to. The sender had likely realized where their notes were ending up and had converted to sturdier materials to get their point across.

Toshinori had to admit he hadn’t expected to receive wooden plaques bearing morals and tiny images of animals or little caricatures of his fellow heroes in more fantastical garbs than their atypical outfits… Well, such things were rather hard to try and keep out of sight and out of mind. Pieces of paper were easy to be gotten rid of but actual gifts such as these made clearly by experienced and well-meaning hands? Eventually, Toshinori succumbed and made use of the empty walls of his new home though he never truly understood just what the sender was trying to say with these strange gifts.

Several days after he had met Izuku Midoriya, the pro-hero found another package waiting for him. He opened it and found another wooden plaque, depicting a majestic hare standing tall and proud before a small and visibly weeping baby bunny that was rather fuzzier than the atypical rabbit ought to be.

_A few kind words can change everything._

Far from disturbed as he had been for the first gift, Toshinori found himself smiling at the wooden plaque and already had a place in mind for it right beside…

He stopped.

Stopped and stared long and hard at the wall. It was a precious thing this wall in particular because it alone bore the few pictures Toshinori possessed of those most precious to him. Pictures that showed friends and family both by blood and by heart though Toshinori Yagi, and more importantly All Might, was absent in every single one of them. However, it was not the precious photographs that had drawn the blonde’s attention but the pair of carved plaques surrounding one of them in particular.

_You can’t change the past, but you can improve the future._

_Don’t let fear close your heart to someone who needs you._

Toshinori slowly looked down at the plaque in his hands.

“… A few kind words, huh.” he murmured quietly to himself. He looked back up at the photos on the wall, his eyes trailing them one by one until they fell on one in particular. He stared at the faces looking back at him, one a childish beam and the other a more matured and wizened smile though both individuals were of the same age.

He pulled out his phone and slowly dialed a number he hadn’t called in five years. He lifted it to his ear and waited for a moment before a tired but familiar voice answered. _“[Hello?]”_

Toshinori’s throat constricted slightly and he coughed uncomfortably. “[Hello.]”

_“… Toshi-san? [Is that you?]”_

“[Yes… Yes it’s me.]”

_“[It’s… It’s been a long time.]”_

“[Yes… yes it has… my friend.]”

* * *

Itsuki Marumaru was the first to arrive in the classroom of 1-A. Surprising but the sun was just barely peaking on the horizon… Sleep was not a luxury he indulged in for the nightmares it often brought, of a life that was not his and a future to hopefully be made for the better in the days to come. He walked into the room, one of his tails closing the door behind him as he went. It was a large door, incredibly so, for such a small class but then given the common trend of slightly larger-than-average people out there, never mind those with the dime-a-dozen Quirks that resulted in size alteration.

Walking down the row closest to the wall opposite of the door, Itsuki silently counted the desks until he reached his assigned seat, number nineteen. Not quite the back corner as he preferred, he hoped that whoever was unfortunate enough to have to sit behind him wouldn’t care about his shell obstructing some of the view.

He looked at his chair and repressed the urge to sigh with relief and sat in it, his tails sliding into the opening that was custom-made for them and sitting in a posture that for once didn’t feel forced or unnatural. As progressive as Japan claimed to be when it came to Mutation-type Quirks, there were few commodities to be found with those whom were of the minority of being off the human baseline.

With little more to do than wait for another few hours yet, Itsuki sat back in his chair, closed his eyes and began his daily meditation.

It wasn’t long before his classmates slowly began trickling in. To them, it looked like he was asleep and they left him to it. Drawn out of his meditation by their presence, Itsuki continued to feign sleeping, listening to the few whispered conversations that pertained to him.

None of them were anything of worth, more rumor and hearsay than anything. Those who participated in the same testing grounds as he for the practical exam likely did not recognize him in his humanoid shape though the resemblance couldn’t be missed in the twined appendages resting on the floor behind him. Still, they only had their suspicions to go on and none of them were rude enough to try and bother him whilst he was “sleeping.”

Feeling enough time had passed, and sensing that all but a few seats were left unoccupied in the classroom, Itsuki snorted loudly and opened his eyes. He looked around the room with a feigned tired expression and silently ticked off the list of those present in the room. _Tenya, Shoto, Tsuyu, Mina… Hardhat, Squeaker, Scarf-Face, Duct-tape, Edgar with his Dark Shadow, Rock Star, and Arts-n-Crafts…_ Itsuki thought to himself, looking about the room and checking off every name in his mental list, a few of them easily recalled by That One and others… not so much.

It was then that he spotted the irregularities.

Sitting beside Rock Star was… _Damn it brain, c’mon…_ **Yui Kodai.**

Yui Kodai! A girl whose Quirk Itsuki knew had something to do with size alteration. That One had read that she was, for lack of a better term, the “leftovers” of what had once been Ochaco’s original character design, which in itself had been split into three resulting heroines. She was supposed to be in Class 1-B. It was a change and one that while surprising was not quite as startling as the other four.

Four people That One had never seen before.

Sitting in the back of the classroom next to Shoto’s desk was a girl whose long auburn hair was somehow both incredibly wild and yet remarkably stylish in design. Her blue eyes were almost hidden by the sheen of her thick-rimmed glasses. She was of average height for a girl, though the fluffiness of her hair made her appear taller, and she was busying herself with a small notebook and mumbling quietly to herself. What little of it that Itsuki could hear made his very brain hurt as mathematical equations and scientific formulas traversed at high speed from the girl’s mouth.

There was a strange familiarity to her, a face that he had seen somewhere before but never really took notice of perhaps… **No, there isn’t.**

At the front row in the sixth seat, was a boy who was quite tall, the fourth tallest in the class and quite spindly too, and like Edgar and Itsuki, bore distinct animal traits. Namely those of an insect with a pair of chitinous antennae sprouting from his brow and curled upwards from the locks of milky white hair with streaks of black not unlike the stripes of a wasp. From where he sat, Itsuki could just barely see that the boy had charcoal-black chitin armor between the cuffs of his uniform jacket and pants. Strangely enough, he wore a pair of gloves over his hands that looked slightly too big for one of his build. His eyes though were the true marvel, milky yellow and very much like those of an arthropod.

He hadn’t seen anyone like that before and while That One had seen renditions of anthropomorphic insects, there hadn’t been any that looked quite like this guy. **Just another insect _._**

Itsuki’s gaze drifted towards the girl that sat at the foremost desk in his row. Similar to the boy and the pig-tailed girl, she wasn’t anyone That One had known to be in Class 1-A or 1-B though… There was a strange sense of familiarity with her appearance. She was the tallest of all the girls present in the classroom and her hair was a dark russet color, too much red to really be brown but not enough to really be pure crimson either. Her… eyes…

_Wow…_ Itsuki swallowed. **Well…**

Her eyes were Red, well and truly deserving of the capitalization. To say that they resembled Itsuki’s own would be a mockery and a falsehood. His were red as blood and just as dark but hers? Oh but how they shined brilliantly like jewels. Itsuki could swear that she was someone That One had known but found himself incapable of drawing forth a name let alone a Quirk as he had with the majority of Class 1-A and 1-B over the years.

Regretfully, he turned his gaze from her to the last of the unknowns. Sitting where Yuga Aoyama was supposed to reside was another girl, one whose eyes were a distinct shade of orange. Her sandy brown hair hung just shy of her shoulders and the top of her head was adorned with a headband of twining metal. The cuffs of her uniform jacket also looked to be slightly larger than the standard and her hands were covered in a pair of white gloves with metallic tips covering the end of her fingers and thumbs. She sat like a stone, still and unmoving but for the faint shuttering of her eyes and slow turn of her head towards the clock, her motions more robotic than human.

_Is she perhaps in some way similar to Tenya? Not fully a machine but not entirely organic?_ ** Perhaps.**

Itsuki swallowed again, golden scales sprouting and descending underneath his flesh in a quick tidal wave of gold.

Three girls and one boy, two of which were clearly possessing some manner of Mutation in their Quirks, or simple alteration of appearance due to their parentage… Four students That One hadn’t known about in Itsuki’s class. Were any of them really aspiring heroes or were they actually villains in disguise? The supposed moles hidden in plain sight amongst the halls of U.A. or were the both of them merely a simple byproduct of his interference in events? Someone that could have been but hadn’t the chance? Were they both just victims of circumstance or was Itsuki thinking too much into this?

_Right, focus. Who else is left?_ Itsuki looked over the room again. _If Kodai is here instead of Class 1-B, and a quartet of new players in the form of Hornet, Professor, Machina, and Red-Eyes…_ _Still missing Bakugo—_

Katsuki Bakugo entered the room with a sneer on his face and a strut to his step, never once giving his fellow classmates so much as a passing glance save for the Blue-eyed girl. Bakugo’s perpetual scowl deepened slightly and he loosed a quiet grunt, glaring at her as she gave him a cheeky smile and wave in return, silver bracelet glinting brightly.

From his seat a few desks behind her, Itsuki frowned at this decidedly odd reaction from a usually far more volatile blonde. _He knows her?_ **She knows him?**

Bakugo proceeded to his assigned seat and took it with boots up atop the desk much to another student’s loud and quite vocal disproval.

Ignoring Tenya Iida’s attempt at disciplinary action, Itsuki continued with his train of thought. _If fate is kind and destiny less of a bitch, than that means that aside from those two making an appearance… Transparency, Pichu, Muffin Man, Sparkles, Wukong, and Grapes Galore either didn’t pass the entrance exam or they’re in Class 1-B_.

If such was the case, Itsuki certainly wished for the best for most of them and fervently hoped that Grapes Galore hadn’t made it in because Itsuki knew that if the midget had gotten sight of the girls now present in 1-A… Well, the end of that particular story would have a certain pair of balls sitting far above those atop the kid’s head. Upper atmosphere at minimum though Itsuki supposed he could aim for higher than that if he actually tried…

“Don’t you think that’s rude to the U.A. upperclassmen and the people who made this desk?”

Itsuki sighed as his thoughts of extreme, though justified, violence were interrupted with the byplay of two polar extremes coming into contact. His tails twitched and he discretely looked out the corner of his eye towards the slightly opened door to see none other than Izuku Midoriya. He smiled, fangs glinting slightly as his shoulders sagged slightly in relief. _There’s our New Hope, Izuku Midoriya…_

“Not a damn bit. What junior high did you go to, side character?” was Katsuki Bakugo’s response with full derisive sneer in place.

Perhaps realizing his rudeness, or mistaking Bakugo’s question as a crude way of making introductions, Tenya answered, “I attended Somei Private Academy. My name is Tenya Iida.”

“Somei?” Bakugo snorted and somehow his sneer became even more condescending. “So you’re a damn elite, huh? I’ll have fun crushing you.”

“Do you truly aim to be a hero?!” exclaimed Tenya.

“Ignore him, he’s just being a brat like usual,” stated the Red-Eyed girl. “The weakest dog is the one that barks the loudest.”

Bakugo stiffened and slowly turned in his seat to glare at the girl who actually looked bored under such vicious scrutiny, like she had seen it many times before in fact, “Say that again. I. Dare. You.”

She didn’t, she just gave him that same smile as before, raising the same hand up as before and—

Itsuki blinked and rubbed his eyes.

_She didn’t._ He looked again. ** She did.**

The girl actually flashed Katsuki Bakugo the Vulcan salute.

Itsuki ducked his head down low to better muffle his guffaw. Really, he didn’t know what was funnier, the look on Bakugo’s face or Tenya, who seemed utterly dumbfounded by the girl’s response and given the reaction from the rest of the class, no one else had any idea what that sign actually meant either. Looking back and forth between the silent competitors of glaring scowl versus beaming smile, Tenya’s eyes caught the open door and found his escape from the increasingly bizarre exchange.

“Ah, it’s you!” Tenya’s sudden exclamation brought everyone’s attention to a now rapidly reddening and stuttering Izuku Midoriya, not that the youngest Iida noticed as he approached the shorter boy and offered a polite ad apologetic bow, “My apologies! I hate to admit it, but you are better than me. You realized that there was something more to the practical exam than just stopping the villainous machines didn’t you? You went out of your way to rescue that girl even at cost to yourself—!”

Spotting Izuku, the spectacled girl’s eyes widened in surprise before she turned in her seat and shot the biggest grin that Itsuki had ever seen at Bakugo who looked as though he had swallowed all of the lemons in the world. The way the blonde boy’s hands were trembling, it looked like he was trying very hard not to loose an explosion or three in the girl’s face.

_Well now…_ **How interesting…**

Fortunately for him, someone else piped up from behind Izuku before the poor boy could even try and get some sensible words out. “Hey, I recognize that hair!”

Itsuki smirked to himself as Ochaco Uraraka arrived with a smile on her voice and a bounce in her step. “And there’s the girl who rescued him in kind.”

Tenya looked close to tears. “Did-Did everyone else realize the point of the exam but me?”

“That’s… That’s not really the case dude,” said Hard-Hat— _No, wait, his name was Kirishima wasn’t it?_ —with an uneasy fanged smile. “I mean, it’s not like any of us went out of our way to help or anything…”

_Wasn’t he at the top ten in rescue points though…?_ **Yes, because THOSE are the details worth focusing on.**

“If you’re here to make friends you should resign right here and now.” A rough and frankly exhausted sounding voice interrupted Ochaco’s cheerful and decidedly one-sided conversation with an increasingly embarrassed Izuku.

The pair turned and looked down at what was undoubtedly their homeroom teacher lying on the hallway floor wrapped up like a caterpillar in his mustard yellow sleeping bag and unknowingly had the exact train of thought.

_Wh-What the heck?!_

“This is the hero course,” said Aizawa-sensei as though him being in a sleeping bag in the halls of the most prestigious hero school in Japan was nothing out of the ordinary. He arose from the floor and stepped out of his sleeping bag, taking time to suck a juice pack dry as he did so.

“I am your homeroom teacher, Shota Aizawa. Morning. Unfortunately.” Ignoring the clear disbelief on his students’ faces, Aizawa-sensei rolled up his sleeping bag and expertly tossed it to land in the chair behind his desk. “Go and change into your gym uniforms then meet me out on the field.”

* * *

One quick change of clothes and venue later found Class 1-A out in the sports field of U.A. with many of their number shocked at their teacher’s blunt declaration of why they were out there.

“A Quirk assessment test?!”

“What about the entrance ceremony? Orientation?” asked Ochaco.

_Boring and extra boring if the principal is anything like what That One remembers._ Itsuki repressed the urge to sigh. _Never mind the principal’s… relapses…_

“If you’re going to become heroes, you don’t have time to waste on leisurely events. U.A.’s selling point is how unrestricted its traditions are.” Aizawa stated tiredly. He looked over his shoulder at the class. “That’s how teachers run their classes here.”

Some of the students exchanged uneasy looks, others merely straightened up at an implied challenge only they perceived. Itsuki merely stood at the back of the crowd with arms crossed over his chest, his face an expressionless mask.

“You’ve done something similar to this in junior high, right? Physical fitness tests where you weren’t allowed to use your Quirks.” Aizawa held up a smartphone, a list of physical exams on full display across the blackened screen. He sighed the sigh of a man who was in desperate need of some sleep or at least a cup of concentrated caffeine. “The Ministry of Education is procrastinating. They still insist on averages made from the results of students not utilizing their Quirks. It’s stupid but that’s the government for you.”

_Damn straight._ Itsuki loosed a small smirk. **Hell the fuck yes.**

“Marumaru, you finished at the top of the practical exam, right?” Aizawa drawled. Itsuki blinked as the eyes of his classmates turned to him, with one pair looking at him with a feral sneer and tightly clenched fists.

“Yes?”

Aizawa stared at him in silence for a moment. “I assume that with your Quirk, they didn’t allow you to participate in these kind of tests?”

Itsuki huffed. “No, they let me participate but they seemed to “misplace” my scores when they realized that I wasn’t going to handicap myself to suit their delusions of normalcy.”

Aizawa’s stare remained as dull and virtually lifeless but Itsuki could feel that the man’s whiskered lips were twitching beneath the folds of his capture cloth. “What was your result for the softball throw then?”

“Two hundred meters give or take?” Itsuki answered with a shrug.

“With or without you using your Quirk to its full potential?”

Itsuki thumped the ground with his tails. “Without.”

Aizawa tossed him a ball, which he caught easily in his left hand. “Then try doing it again with your Quirk this time. You can do whatever you want as long as you stay in the circle.” He indicated the marked earth.

Itsuki nodded and walked over to the circle, which was large enough that he could stand within it easily as a human. He’d have little room to maneuver in such a confined space if he were to transform into his smallest form.

The golden-haired teen tested the weight of the baseball, feeling the faint grooves of the material with his fingers. There was a faint heft from its inner machinery as he tossed it lightly up and down. “How durable is this thing exactly?”

“Durable enough to withstand the force of an atomic bomb,” was Aizawa’s dry response. **…!**

Itsuki’s hand caught the ball in a tight grip and he slowly looked back towards his teacher whose face was as blank as stone. Golden scales rippled beneath the tall boy’s flesh and the nails of his tightly clenched hand lengthened into claws before he loosed a long, slow sigh and turned back to stare down at the ball in his grasp. Unnoticed by anyone but Aizawa, Itsuki’s right hand trembled slightly as he spoke. “So we can do whatever we want so long as we stay in the circle. Right?”

“Correct.”

“Fine. Let us shoot for the moon.”

Itsuki tossed the ball up into the air and caught it between draconic jaws. He stood thirty feet tall, clawed feet just barely toeing the line of the circle, arms long enough for his clawed fingers to dig deep into the loam beneath him. His arms trembled with the same familiar agony as before and just the same, he withstood it.

“Whoa!”

“What kinda Quirk is that?!”

“Is he a dragon?”

“It’s him, I knew it!”

“Kawaii…!”

Ignoring the byplay of his classmates behind him, Itsuki raised his head up, sinuous neck aglow with inner light as electrical arcs danced like vicious vipers between his gaping fangs. Within his open jaw, the ball floated in a field of warping magnetics and distorted gravitational forces before it was expelled out in a blast of lightning that, were it made even the slightest bit less durable, would have vaporized it to ash.

The bolt of energy traveled high into the open air and the ball soared even higher with a thunderous crack of noise and force that sent many of the students stumbling backwards out of sheer surprise. The miniscule missile continued to soar every higher, as multiple cracks of thunderous noise echoed from the now clear sky, what few clouds they were scattered to the four corners from the sheer force of the ball’s passage into and out of the upper atmosphere.

Aizawa looked down at his phone and even his eyes widened slightly at what he read. He loosed a quiet whistle only the sharpest of ears could hear before turning the phone up for the rest of the class to see.

“Three-hundred eighty four…” a thoroughly gob-smacked Kirishima uttered.

“Kilometers?” choked Mina.

Wrong. They hadn’t noticed it, the tiny number in the upper corner that denoted a far greater scale. Itsuki had seen it and his eyes went once more to the sky even though the ball was long gone even from his enhanced sight. He shrunk back down to his previous stature and form, his right hand trembling before suddenly snapping into a fist. **You FOOL!**

SMACK.

His classmates jumped, not a one of them expecting Itsuki to suddenly punch himself in the face like that. However, for all that he had struck himself hard enough to knock most people unconscious, there was nary a bruise to be found beneath his clenched knuckles. Itsuki loosed a quiet hiss, twin tails twisting tightly.

“Apologies. We— **I** … had been joking, Aizawa-sensei. I had no intention of actually hitting it.”

“It…?” repeated Izuku, he looked back at Aizawa’s phone, eyes widening in realization as he spotted a minor detail most of the class had missed.

Itsuki’s fist remained pressed against his face as he spoke up for everyone to hear. “I’m not going to get in trouble for adding another crater on the moon am I?”

“To be fair,” Aizawa spoke up with a tired drawl as many of his students tried, and repeatedly failed, to process that clarification, “it’s a prediction of how far the ball will go before it stops moving. There have been students previously who received “infinity” as a score. While the chances weren’t exactly high for it, such a throw, if one could even call what you did throwing, had a smaller chance of hitting any potentially large satellites.”

_Large satellites like the gosh-darned moon!_ Such was the shared opinion shared amongst the class though different only in that, save for a certain cinnamon roll and two sticklers for proper behavior, they all had far more colorful words to put as an appropriate adjective.

“That’s unreal…” Kirishima couldn’t help a grin. “But I can feel my blood pumping with excitement!”

“This could actually be fun!” exclaimed Mina as Yui nodded beside her.

“Mhm.”

“We can actually use our Quirks as much as we want!” Duct-Tape pumped his fist excitedly. “As expected of the hero course.”

Itsuki closed his eyes and sighed again as he lowered his arm back down to his side. _Gods damn it…_

“… ‘Fun,’ huh?” Aizawa murmured and any good cheer promptly died with all the grace of a punctured balloon as the man turned a hardened and slightly mad gaze to his students. “You have three years to become heroes. Will you have an attitude like that the whole time you’re here? Fine. Whomever comes in last place obviously has no potential and will be expelled.”

“HUH?!” **Oh yes. This.**

“Expelled?! But-But—! It’s the first day of school! No, even if it wasn’t the first day, this is too unfair!” exclaimed Ochaco. **Come on. Let’s give them a show…**

“Fair?” A quiet chuckle interrupted Aizawa’s answer before it even had a chance to be spoken. The darkly dressed teacher turned with the rest of the class to look over at Itsuki Marumaru, who had devolved into outright laughter.

“Fair?” repeated Itsuki like the word was something foul in his mouth, “Just another lie, another falsehood among countless others. Where is the fairness in a town crumbling to pieces from the earth’s quaking the foundations apart? Where is the fairness of a mother fighting with all that she has to save her child from a burning building only to emerge with a corpse? Where is the fairness in having hope when it is always the first thing to die?”

Itsuki looked over his classmates and was silently pleased that not a one of them looked away. True, some were disheartened, others disgusted, and a few even standing firm to their own beliefs but each and every one of them met his gaze regardless.

“It’s here,” he said, tapping at his chest, directly above his heart as he walked out of the circle. He reached out and pointed at Izuku’s heart, “Right there,” at Ochaco’s, “Here too. Fairness is just another lie, so it’s up to heroes to make it truth. To stand as a shield against disasters, to be the shoulders for victims to lean against, and to bring hope back from the ashes. If you fail here, does that mean you end? Does that mean you stop being a hero? Because if that’s all that it takes, over there’s the door, don’t let it hit you on the way out.”

No one moved though plenty straightened their spines as their gelatinous resolve hardened into steel.

“If you’re quite finished…?” droned Aizawa.

“Finished?” Itsuki turned to look back at the man. He didn’t smile. He showed his teeth. “Sensei, we’re nowhere near finished.”

* * *

Rather than having the rest of his classmates continue in Itsuki’s example of the softball throw, Aizawa opted to follow the order of athletic trials as they were presented on his phone. Though unasked, he supplied the simple answer of it being too much of a hassle to go out of order. Itsuki took the man’s antics in stride despite the pro-hero derailing the mood Itsuki had set into a train wreck.

That’s just how the man was, both as a teacher and as a pro. Itsuki knew that Aizawa could, and maybe even would, expel any one of them easily and not strictly because of a lack of ability. Aizawa was one of the few sane individuals in a world full of madness after all…

If nothing else, it presented Itsuki both the opportunity to learn the Quirks of the newcomers and the side benefit of relearning those whose names he could not properly recall.

* * *

**50-Meter Dash**

Aizawa glanced at his tablet, “Fumiko Sato, you’re up.”

Itsuki looked over and saw the spectacled auburn-haired girl walking forward and—He blinked. _Wait… Sato…_

As Jirou took up the standard runner’s position, Fumiko reached into her pocket and pulled out a small tin box. She opened it up and carefully pulled out a tiny cube of sugar, frowning all the while. She sighed and tossed it into her mouth and took her position beside Jirou. “Sorry in advance.”

Before Jirou could speak in response to that, the droid fired its air pistol and—

Itsuki’s eyes snapped wide open as Fumiko’s gym jacket exploded to shreds before she took off like a rocket. The ground at the starting line exploded from the force and her feet barely touched the ground as she ran and swiftly slid to a halt just a microsecond before Tenya’s time. “Whoot! Yeah that’s what I’m talking about!”

Most of the crowd was standing slack-jawed at the sight though not all for the same reason. With her jacket little more than faint tatters lost to the winds, Fumiko’s shirt left little to the imagination and revealed that Momo wasn’t the only one that had been blessed. Not that Itsuki really took notice of that since his eyes were too busy scanning over Fumiko’s entire body. For all that she acted and wore the look of a nerd, she was quite muscular though not overly so. Rather, she was built like one who did in fact lift both often and heavily with arms and legs alike.

_So in essence she is—_

“My brother Rikido thinks he’s tough shit when he powers up but he doesn’t have anything on me! He’s hardly a challenge anymore even when he’s completely hulked out! C’mon who else wants a go?! I can take any one of you on!” She declared, going through a series of kicks and punches that would make any martial artist worth their belt turn either green with envy or pale in terror given how fast she was moving, especially her kicks.

_… A unmentioned sister apparently._

As if sensing his gaze, Fumiko sharply turned to him and pointed. “You! You want some!”

Acting without his mental consent, Itsuki’s mouth answered, “Well I wouldn’t say no if you are offering…”

“Ha!” She rolled her arm, “I think I might like you, Cutie!” She blinked. Then flushed red, and she hastily pushed her glasses up, the lenses flashes in the sunlight. “No I don’t!”

Far from surprised by the sudden shift in personality, he was actually expecting it really given the severe shift from stern librarian to battle-hungry exhibitionist, Itsuki tilted his head in mock confusion, “But you just said—”

“My brain gets weird when I use my Quirk alright! I-I get all—”

“Thirsty?” suggested Mina with a Cheshire grin. Barely into the first day of school and already she had a few ships to set sailing!

“Ye-NO! _Spicy!_ I get spicy!”

“As entertaining as this isn’t,” drawled Aizawa, “we’ve got more tests to go through.”

As the still blushing Fumiko shuffled past him, Itsuki said, “I meant what I said. If you ever want to spar, I wouldn’t say no.”

She stopped and looked up at him out the corner of one eye. “… Not above hitting a girl?”

“Not if she hits me first.”

She snorted and looked away, trying and failing to hide a small smile. “We’ll see.”

He should leave it there he really, really should—“So you think I’m cute?”

“Sh-Shut up!”

* * *

Fumiko Sato  
Quirk: Sugar-n-Spice

_"For every gram of sugar she eats, her strength is multiplied for a similar length of time! With three grams, it’s three times the power for approximately three minutes! However! Whilst under the influence of her Quirk, her personality becomes “spicy” as a result!"_

* * *

**Grip Strength**

“Katsura Mafune huh…” muttered Itsuki, looking over at the girl with the eyes of Blue and one who was a machine at least in part. In every test thus far, she had displayed a degree of prowess that was above the human norm never mind the superhuman.

Credit to Tenya, he did not break down and cry though the crack in his composure was pretty obvious to everyone present. It was helped by the fact that Katsura Mafune was emotionless to the point that Shoto Todoroki was like a kid loosed into a toy store after consuming their body weight in sugar in comparison. She only spoke when spoken to and her responses were prompt and to the point. A byproduct of her Quirk or upbringing, Itsuki could only guess.

A faint growl drew his attention towards Bakugo, who was glaring heatedly at the strength tester in his grasp muttering a storm of swears and other foul oaths. Itsuki supposed that was the one advantage to so many strong unknowns in the class, Bakugo never managed to reach first place in any test thus far.

In point of fact, the highest he had managed to score thus far had been fifth place. Standing opposite of him, and honestly otherwise distracted by Katsura, Itsuki couldn’t quite hear what it was that he had said but it had to have been bad enough to have Jirou wince and take more than a few steps away from him and—

**CRUNCH!**

Itsuki did not jump nor did he squeal and he most certainly did not yelp. He left that for the rest of the class as he calmly turned his serpentine gaze back to Katsura Mafune who was looking down at the crushed remains of the grip tester.

“Ah. My apologies. I did not intend to damage this device.”

If Aizawa was surprised or irked, he failed to show it. He sighed the sigh of a man who was either too old or too tired for this degree of silliness and wordlessly pointed to a recycle can in the corner.

She shook her head. “That will not be necessary.”

Mafune formed a small circle with her fingers and thumb before she reached down and grasped the broken pieces. With a faint metallic light, the pieces seamlessly came together once more. She held the restored device in her hand and frowned slightly. “I’m afraid that I could only restore it to its previous functionality and not improve its capabilities beyond a margin of 9.74%.”

… _Definitely more machine than human…_ **Katsura Mafune…? Why does that sound so… familiar?**

* * *

Katsura Mafune  
Quirk: Deus ex Machina

_"Her body is iron and gold surrounds her heart! Don’t let her steely exterior fool you her Quirk requires a gentle touch to work its magic on technology and when it does watch out! What once was broken becomes whole or even better than previously described once she’s done with it!"_

* * *

**Standing Long Jump**

“Yōsei Kurokage, you’re up,” sighed Aizawa-sensei as Fumiko came jogging back, fists flying in mock punches as she wound down. Itsuki glanced over at the only other boy who had given both him and Shoji a run for their money in the grip test.

“As you command,” Kurokage saluted before stepping up to the starting line. He crouched down low enough that his hands were lightly touching upon the earth before he leapt skyward with enough force to actually cause an explosion of dirt and grass.

The class watched with wide, disbelieving eyes as the insect-bodied teen reached an apex of 690 feet straight up in the air before he came crashing back down well outside the range of the sandbox.

If Aizawa was impressed by the feat, he didn’t show it, instead looking disgruntled at the damaged earth of the starting line. “I’m starting to sense a trend in this particular class…”

Itsuki glanced over at Mafune. Her face was still expressionless but she seemed to now be making it a point to look anywhere but in their teacher’s direction, her cheeks lightly dusted in pink. He shook his head and looked back up as Kurokage came jogging back. Seeing where Aizawa was staring, he flinched and offered a hasty bow.

“Our sincerest of apologies, it is not often we are given permission to, as you say, let loose. We saw an opportunity to, as you say, stretch our legs and took to it perhaps a bit too gladly.”

“Dude, that was intense!” exclaimed Sero.

“You broke the ground just from leaping!” Kirishima cheered.

“Even I didn’t do that, kero…” muttered Tsuyu.

Itsuki glanced at the girl out the corner of his eye. _Says the girl who managed 30 meters without actually leaping as a frog would._

“Our body is equivalent to certain species of insect if enlarged to human standard. Most insects are capable of leaping can reach height several hundred times their own and so too, can we as we are.”

“That explains a lot actually. Several species of insects can reach over a hundred times their own body length in height alone.”

Let it be said that even in the midst of a complete and utter anxiety attack, Izuku Midoriya will not be deterred in his quest to analyze Quirks down to the finest detail whilst mumbling like a crazy person.

“The froghopper is said to experience 400 gravities of acceleration when it jumps, which is 80 times greater than rockets undergo when launching into space.” Fumiko distractedly noted, writing in her own notebook. To her credit, she wasn’t actually taking notes on her peers like Izuku would had he the foresight to actually bring his notebook along, but she was being inspired by them. Though what that inspiration entailed, Itsuki couldn’t say.

Frankly, he was too busy looking disbelievingly at the rest of his peers. _… Is no one going to bring up the fact that he keeps referring to himself as “we”?_ **Crazy isn’t it?**

* * *

Yōsei Kurokage  
Quirk: Insect Body

_"His body is like an insect’s! He strikes like a bee, jumps like a grasshopper, smells like an ant, you name it he can probably do it or at least fake it like no one else can!"_

* * *

**Ball Throw**

At long last, the ball throw had come about as the final, though initially first, test. Most of the class had already gone and those left were none other than Izuku Midoriya and the last unknown of the class…

“Tiffany Zumwalt…” murmured Itsuki softly to himself. The girl had been a constant source of distraction to him since the beginning, more so than Kurokage and Mafune combined. Itsuki couldn’t shake away the strange sense of déjà vu whenever his eyes happened upon her and he found his gaze wandering towards her with increasing frequency. She was like some sort of half-forgotten daydream that never truly left the dusty cobwebbed corners of his mind. A stray thought that continued to tease him whenever his mind wandered from the here and now…

… And he was waxing poetic again. **Focus. Who is she? What is she capable of?**

She gave no hint of what her Quirk actually was in any of the tests though her scores at least hinted she was above the former human standard in athletics. She was… strange. Genuinely nice if a bit sarcastic to most everyone in the class save for Bakugo and Izuku. To the latter, she was like a teasing older sister, offering encouragement to the freckled boy in the most embarrassing of fashions only an elder sibling could be capable of doing and earning many a snicker or smile from the rest of the class. As for Bakugo…

“That was a cheap shot, Katsushit!” she had called out to him as his explosions sent Izuku stumbling in the 50-meter dash.

Her tongue proved to be just as barbed as Bakugo’s own though her words were always spoken with an angelic smile and in a glowing fashion. Like she knew something that no one else did given the way that Bakugo and Izuku both reacted whenever she booed and cheered for them respectively.

Stranger still, for reasons known only to Bakugo himself, the volatile teenager actually took Tiffany’s words to heart. Well, insomuch that rather than the reaction that Itsuki had expected, which is to say explosions with enough cussing to do a sailor proud, Bakugo quite visibly restrained himself in the following trials, utilizing his Quirk in a way that wouldn’t inhibit another’s performance.

Didn’t stop him from cussing under his breath whenever Tiffany was out of earshot though. Itsuki had to wonder at Bakugo’s nickname for her though. _She-Demon? What could she have done to earn that nickname?_ **It is a worthless title. Do not concern yourself over it.**

Now she stood at the pitch and tossing the ball up and down in her hand just as he had done what felt like hours past. She caught the ball and gripped it tightly with both hands held out in front of her as her eyes narrowed in concentration. Slowly, she pulled her hands apart and the ball remained aloft in between her palms as glowing pentagons of tinted light flashed into being. The small orb was ricocheting within the field with increasing speed. Jirou cringed, hands going over her ears before the noise grew loud enough for the rest of the class to hear it.

_That sounds like…_ **A cacophony of church bells…?**

With a shout, Tiffany lifted her hands high and the fields shattered with a noise like breaking glass followed with the thunderous roar of the sound barrier being broken. Most of the class ends up on the ground, few having been prepared for such a startling result from a girl who had demonstrated a distinct lack of metaphysical prowess of any sort.

Aizawa, impassive as always, looked down at his phone, grunted, and held it out for everyone else to see.

“Oh come on!”

“Infinity?!”

“God-damn it!”

“That’s two now!”

“Technically three if you count Marumaru-kun’s throw, kero.”

_No,_ Itsuki shook his head. _It is two for two_. Because for all that Ochaco had scored infinity in her ball toss, it was as Aizawa had explained for Itsuki’s toss, an estimation based on the prowess demonstrated by her Quirk. Until the brunette released the ball back into gravity’s sway, it would eventually traverse outside the planet’s atmosphere and disappear into the expanse of space. It would take a substantial amount of time given that Ochaco hadn’t really tossed the ball all that hard but it could happen all the same.

For Itsuki and Tiffany however, they both had sundered the sound barrier and atmosphere alike within seconds. It wasn’t a question of possibility. It was a statement of utmost certainty.

Tiffany stood up and dusted herself off as though she hadn’t just launched a baseball into orbit. She turned and looked to the class with an angelic smile and held up a hand in…

Itsuki groaned and palmed his face.

_The god-damned Vulcan salute again?! I’m pretty sure it doesn’t mean what she thinks it means!_

* * *

Tiffany Zumwalt  
Quirk: Absolute Territory

_"She can create force fields so strong that they can repel anything! From a nuclear blast to regular air, nothing is allowed entry within her field of Absolute Territory! The stronger the impact on the field, the more it is repelled back!"_

* * *

Following Izuku’s demonstration of the power, and lack of control, of his Quirk, the tests were finally finished and that class stood with baited breath before Aizawa as he displayed their scores for them all to see. Standing at the back alongside the equally tall Shoji, Itsuki frowned slightly at where he sat on the scoreboard.

_Damn it._

First place.

True, he had been consistently at the top three if not first outright, but he didn’t give it his all and Aizawa had to have seen that. Sure, he had been outdone in the grip strength tester by Mafune, had leapt just shy of Kurokage and Tsuyu had, and for all that he had added yet another crater to the face of the moon it still didn’t beat the score of infinity that Ochaco and Zumwalt had gotten… A few high scores couldn’t outpace a constant average of second or third. Where some had stumbled he still excelled consistently and without fail despite holding himself back as far as he dared and for those that he hadn’t…

Well, he was quick to punish himself for it with a swift mental punch to the face each and every time, his right fist trembling every now and again as he struggled with the urge _to **just**_ —!

“By the way, I lied.” Aizawa stated, snapping Itsuki back to the present. “No one’s getting expelled.”

Itsuki heaved an unheard sigh. It was an insignificant thing in the overall grand scheme, but it was a small sign that assured That One’s memories held some grain of truth. Most everyone’s reactions though were as loud as they were comical save for a select few.

“Of course that was a lie. It should’ve been obvious if you just thought it through,” said Yaoyorozu.

He knew better to speak up, he really did, but— **No. Let us tell them what kind of man their teacher is.**

Itsuki shook his head, “Yeah, no. He’s done it before. Would have done it now. Could still do it later.” He smiled but there was no joy in it, only fanged teeth. “It doesn’t matter if you bought your way in, got in on the word of some Pro-Hero, or by your own merits. He’s the one and only teacher in U.A. who expelled an entire class in a single semester because none of them had any potential.”

Aizawa’s smile grew just the tiniest bit more, his eyes widening by the tiniest of fractions. Those students closest to him took a generous step back en masse and those further back were very grateful for the human shields between them and their clearly unhinged teacher.

Itsuki matched the deranged grin with fangs flashing in fierce determination, his eyes gleaming red as his tails waved back and forth behind him, spiked tips rattling. “Challenge accepted, Aizawa-sensei.”

Aizawa continued his disturbing stare for a moment more before it was suddenly gone as though a switch had been flipped and his face returned to its usual exhausted expression. “…We’ll see how long that attitude lasts in the days ahead. The tests you all will face will be far more rigorous than today’s. Prepare yourselves well. For now though, head back to the classroom. There will be handouts with the curriculum and such waiting for you there so make sure you look them over.”

Their teacher turned and walked off without another word. The students watched him go, most of them as though expecting him to suddenly go on the attack. Aizawa stopped and quite a few students weren’t afraid to admit that they flinched. Not out loud of course but the sentiment was there regardless.

“Midoriya.” Especially Izuku.

“Y-Yes, sir?!” he stammered with a healthy degree of fear.

“Make sure to see the old lady first.”

“Yes, sir…” he sighed with no small measure of relief.

Only when their sensei turned and disappeared around the corner did any of them deign it safe enough to speak and for some to actually start breathing again.

“Dude… That was so manly!” Eijiro declared, fist held up and a bright, fanged grin on his face. “You better believe I’m up for the challenge, any time any place!”

“Still that was kinda nerve-wracking, though…” Shoji muttered tiredly, rubbing the back of his neck.

“And it’s only going to get worse from here,” groaned Kurokage, rubbing his forehead tiredly. “We honestly don’t know whether we should feel elated or terrified…”

“I believe the correct emotional response would be to process them both in equal measures,” stated Mafune.

“Aizawa-sensei didn’t really expel a whole class did he?” asked Mina, turning to look up at Itsuki.

“Yeah, you were kidding about that whole expulsion thing right? That was just another attempt at psyching us up… Right?” asked Sero.

Itsuki looked back and forth between the both of them for a moment before reaching out and patting Sero on the shoulder and walking away.

“… That wasn’t an answer!” Mina called after him whilst Sero proceeded to, rather justifiably, freak out, much to Jiro’s bemusement.

Itsuki ignored her and kept walking, hiding the fact that though he walked with as much confidence as he had displayed before Aizawa and the rest of his class, Itsuki’s face was one of dread. His blood, usually burning hot in his veins, felt like slushes of ice. Scales sprouted and withdrew from his trembling and tightly clenched fists.

Fumiko Sato, Yōsei Kurokage, Katsura Mafune, and Tiffany Zumwalt. One entirely new and completely unknown classmate was a fluke of fate and thus forgivable, even conceivable, two a bit concerning, three absolutely startling, but FOUR such as this? Four potential heroes who made the cut into the prestigious, if not cursed, Class 1-A with That One having not seen or heard even the tiniest thing about them?

No. **Something isn’t right…**

Something was wrong. **They aren’t supposed to be here.**

_That One didn’t know about Zumwalt, Mafune, or Kurokage_ _and had no idea that Sato had a sister with a similar Quirk. If That One didn’t know anything about them… then what else doesn’t That One know?_ **We know enough. Wait and see.**

… He’d just have to wait and see.


	4. EPISODE 3.0: Warriors

_In youth you'd lay awake at night and scheme of all the things that you would change…  
But it was just a dream!_

  
 _Where is the damn coffee…?_ Shoto Aizawa tiredly rubbed his eyes, pointedly ignoring the other teachers bustling about energetically around the teachers’ lounge. True, a few of them were tired but clearly not wishing for the sweet embrace of Death as Aizawa was.

That and a strong cup of liquid caffeine preferably with enough espresso shots to put a man’s heart into orbit.

Shoto Aizawa was rather infamous for possessing what many a total stranger and a few close acquaintances would call a contradictory nature. Unlike the everyday hero in Japan, Aizawa made it a point to avoid the spotlight, finding such things as public opinion to sit so far on the backburner it was oftentimes left several miles back in his pursuit of justice. For all that he avoided fame and fortune, the hero known as Eraserhead was arguably one of the hardest working heroes to ever grace Japan’s soil, second perhaps only to the likes of All Might himself, at least to those whom had been saved by him.

As a teacher, he was equally as strange. For one, he made it no secret that he was, to put it mildly, far too tired to deal with any such crap as the atypical courtesy teachers allotted to their students. Instead, he offered a degree of respect and focus upon his students’ education in heroics and the atypical classwork of a high school that few students ever received even from the most accredited of educators.

If he thought them an idiot, he would declare them as such and either teach them the correct methods of reducing such stupidity himself or see that they never graced his classroom again. Sadly, it was often the latter option that proved to be the best one.

Once, he had seen an entire class expelled because not a one of them had any potential of being a hero.

Not. A. One.

Of course, being such a contrarian, the term “expelling” was not precisely the most accurate of terms. Certainly, they had been expelled from the hero course but from the entirety of U.A.? No, even the most lacking of students still proved that they possessed both the brilliance and the drive to at least succeed in the educational courses that U.A. provided. With such a freedom allotted to him and the frequency that he used, or as some say abused, such freedoms, one would think that Shoto Aizawa actually enjoyed crushing the dreams and aspirations of children.

They were wrong.

Despite what his reputation might allude, he took no pleasure in expelling that class and had kept an eye on each and every one them ever when they had walked away from U.A. for the last time. Not a one of them had ended up becoming heroes, at least not in the way they had wanted, but to date each and every one of them was alive and that was all that Aizawa wanted, even more than their happiness or their appreciation.

To a lot of people, what Aizawa had done could be considered cruel, unfair, and yes even heartless but to the man himself?

It was the greatest act of kindness he could give.

After all, isn’t it better to kill the dream than allow the dreamer to die?

Aizawa privately wondered if his new batch of students would be the class that would make it all the way to the end. In the years both before and after that extreme act, not a one of his classes had graduated with the same number of students it had started with. Not for the first time, Aizawa privately wondered if Nezu had something against him as he saw that the majority of his class consisted of the very students whom he was forced to give his opinion on.

All of them with some exceptionally powerful Quirks, all spoken of highly by their teachers and their peers save for one who was nothing if not notorious in his history.

Itsuki Marumaru. One of the few survivors found in the aftermath of what more polite individuals would call the Tokyo Incident though what Aizawa himself referred to as a total and complete cluster fuck. The kid had been diagnosed with an extreme case of amnesia and despite the attempts made to discern his true identity he was labeled as a Marumaru, a “zero” person without a name or identity.

The name “Itsuki” was apparently the kid’s own choice and there was the source of Aizawa’s interest.

Depending on the kanji used, “Itsuki” could mean many things. The way that Marumaru wrote it, it meant “One and Only Hope.” Pompous, arrogant, and conceited were just a few words that would have immediately sprung to Aizawa’s mind had Itsuki not chosen to remain as a Marumaru rather than adopting a new family name for himself.

While such things were not common, it wasn’t unheard of for people in similar situations to adopt new last names. More often than not, they’d adopt the last name of the company involved in their new identity, such as the name of the hospital that treated them. That the kid would still keep the family name of Marumaru, literally circle-circle whilst taking such a presumptuous name as Itsuki…

 _A person without worth who stands as the one and only hope…_ Aizawa shook his head and moved on through the kid’s file.

There was no record of any formal adoption, or even a home address. In fact, the only address in the kid’s file was a P.O. box located a few blocks away from the warehouse district of Arkanis, which from what little Aizawa had managed to find, had only been purchased a few months before the entrance exams. Beyond that, the closest thing Aizawa had to go on was his previous school’s address, which was located Wakkanai, Hokkaido with a miniscule population of under thirty thousand to Mustafu’s three million. That city was so far north it was a good twenty-hour drive —at best— to get there.

By foot, it’d take eight days and again that was being far too generous.

There were a multitude of reasons that Aizawa could conceive of for why the kid would choose to go so far north. The problem those was each and every one of those reasons brought forth more questions than answers. Looking at Marumaru’s student ID picture, Aizawa could at least cross off the notion that perhaps the boy had rediscovered his family. Though not as familiar with the signs as some other pros are, even an Underground Hero like Eraserhead could see that the kid was someone whose full course meal consisted of stale bread and instant ramen cups and home was anyplace that had four walls and a ceiling.

Even decades since Japan had finally taken notice of the homeless situation, there were still the mindset of pushing them aside for the “beautification of the environment.” So long as they were out of sight, then they could be out of mind and what better way was there than to allow them to hole themselves up wherever they could and keep them from going out into the open begging for money when they were given a, extremely small, stipend? Even places as remote as Wakkanai were no different than Tokyo proper in this regard.

But such thoughts were mere presumptions, conjectures, and assumptions. No solid facts than what his eyes and personal experiences could tell him. He’d have to try and follow the kid home to see how bad Marumaru’s living situation truly was before he could commit himself fully to anything.

Looking over Marumaru’s grades, Aizawa wasn’t surprised to find them to be fairly average save for his physical exams. The only grades for them that were actually listed in the kid’s records were from his first year in middle school. Another bit of governmental hypocrisy along with an unhealthy amount of pure stupidity from the public. Marumaru had an entire folder devoted to reprimands of constant Quirk usage for his physical courses that was ridiculously thick. Mutation-type Quirks, while not rare were still uncommon enough that there was still something of a stigma among the populace, the common mob mentality to abhor that what did not fit into the circle of normality.

Though Aizawa wondered if it was intentional on the kid’s part and once more shook off the strange sense of déjà vu. There was something eerily familiar about the kid, but the memory was buried beneath the morning fog of exhaustion and extreme bitterness.

 _Seriously, where did Yamada go to get the damn coffee?_ Aizawa scowled at the closed door to the lounge, as though hoping by mere thought alone his boisterous co-worker would emerge onto the scene with liquid darkness in hand. A moment passed and sweet, blessed quiet continued unbroken so Aizawa allowed himself a tired yawn.

It didn’t sit well with him that the kid had next to nothing to say about his Quirk, and for all the reprimands he had stacked up for using it, his past teachers had little to actually say about it beyond the blatantly, and at times stupidly, obvious. A transformation-type Quirk into some manner of beast, not altogether that uncommon in the likes of Japan though the powers and abilities of the altered form were always distinct to the individual even when the form was remarkably similar to another’s own.

For all appearances, Marumaru’s alternate form appeared to be some manner of reptilian creature. One that generated a ludicrous amount of electricity given the kid utilized enough to turn his mouth into a rail gun and added another crater to the moon. That had been the one and only time that Marumaru had demonstrated a majority of his prowess during the Quirk Apprehension Tests and the way that the kid had reacted afterwards to Aizawa’s “little white lie”…

That Marumaru had known about that one class wasn’t that surprising. The information was readily available to anyone if they knew precisely where to look but therein lay the conundrum. It wasn’t a question of how Marumaru had known but _why_. Why would the kid have sought the information out in the first place? He couldn’t have known that Aizawa was going to be his homeroom teacher and even if he had, Marumaru clearly did not give his all throughout the Quirk Assessment Tests.

 _Why would he do that…?_ Aizawa realized with a grim frown, blatantly ignoring Yamada’s boisterous entrance into the lounge with loud decrees of bearing gifts of caffeine and powdered goodness. Aizawa took his offered cup with a near silent grunt of thanks and took a long sip.

 _Except for the ball throw, he only did enough to actually stay close to the top but never purposefully pushed himself._ _Why? The kid knows I have expelled students from the hero course before, had stated so outright in front of the whole class in fact, so why hold back?_

Aizawa glanced towards the newest annoying blonde that had become a part of his daily life and wondered if All Might would succeed where he had failed. He silently wished the man luck and took another drink of darkened sweetness in a cup—

The underground pro-hero blinked and glared down at his coffee as though it were one of the most offensive things he had ever seen. In fairness to the sugary sweet cup of coffee, it had earned second place only because the number one offender was sitting across from him with a completely unrepentant grin on his smug face.

His mood once more souring back into the black pit from whence it had dared to emerge into the light of hopeful optimism, Aizawa leveled a glare that had caused many a villain to loosen their bowels in extreme excess. “Damn it Yamada, I said no sugar…”

“Sorry, not sorry!”

* * *

It was strange to consider the idea that for all that it was the best high school in all of Japan for aspiring heroes, U.A. was still in fact a high school. This meant that for all the effort and details that went into training aspiring heroes, supporters, and even management, a lot more went into general education both in and outside that same-named course. Mornings were spent with Pro-Heroes as teachers not in the art of heroics but simple, if not educational, lessons.

As he sat through Yamada-sensei’s English lesson, the last one before lunch and the afternoon course that would wrap up his second day, Itsuki found himself wondering something that had even bothered That One. Why did the teachers insist on wearing their heroic attire even when teaching the basic educational classes? Recognition? Preparation? He could understand most of them choosing to be addressed by their heroic aliases as even in this day and age where only the vigilantes kept their identities a secret, almost all Pro-Heroes were recognized firstly by their aliases and rarely their own names.

Hell, That One hadn’t even known whether or not Izuku had ever learned All Might’s actual name by the time—

“So which of these sentences are wrong?” asked Present Mic quietly before suddenly shouting with fanfare and interrupting Itsuki’s attempt at distracting himself, “Everybody, heads up! Let’s get this party started!”

Itsuki’s right hand shot up faster than a blink and before Present Mic even had a chance to call on his name, answered, “[The pronoun is in the wrong place in the fourth sentence and aside from misspelling the word “will” for “well” in the third, I don’t think that anyone talks like that unless they want to sound like a pretentious punk. Same for the second sentence too for that matter.]”

Itsuki blinked and noticed that Present Mic was staring at him. In point of fact, everyone in the classroom was staring at him. The vocal hero’s smile turned devious.

“[Well I got to say I’m impressed~!]” Present Mic laughed and gave Itsuki a quick thumbs up. “[Do I detect a New York accent in your voice, hero-in-the-making?]”

 _… I really am going to end up hating this man aren’t I?_ **Immensely.**

Lunch and the cafeteria itself were both humble and extravagant all at once. Humble in design, humble in price, but lucrative in options that bordered between the meager foodstuffs to a meal fit for a king. Seriously, where else would someone find a meal of fillet mignon at the same price as a classic peanut butter sandwich? They even served those requiring a more… unique blend of dietary needs than most by the head-chef himself if need be.

“You want a lump o’ what?” Lunch Rush asked in clear disbelief.

“Copper though aluminum or zinc is fine too if you can make either of those.”

“Boy, I say, boy with my Quirk I can make anyt’in’ so long as the recipient can safely, I say _safely_ , digest my preparations. Stops little upstarts like that there boy from 1-B from gettin’ anythin’ he’s too young too be drinkin’ if you catch my drift. Don’t, I say don’t, inform him that his wine is just prune juice, y’hear? That boy’s got a rod stuck up the old tailpipe somet’ing fierce…” Lunch Rush said before he worked his magic. With a small thump, a neatly cut square piece of copper was added to Itsuki’s full tray of food. If the Cook Hero was surprised, he didn’t show it. “Enjoy, I say enjoy your lunch, y’hear?”

After lunch came the class that Itsuki was both dreading and looking forward to the most. Hero Basic Training with none other than…

“I am here…! Coming through the door like a normal person!”

The adorkable All Might himself.

 _Gods-damn it, he really is a precious cinnamon roll._ **Such a thing…**

“Oh man, it’s really him!”

“All Might!”

“He really is a teacher here!”

“That costume is from the Silver Age, isn’t it?”

All Might stood tall and proud behind the podium as he overlooked the class, “Good afternoon! From this day forward, I will be teaching Hero Basic Training, a subject where you train in different ways to learn the basics of being a hero. Let’s get right into it! Today’s lesson will pull no punches!”

He whipped out a hand, displaying a card with the word **COMBAT** almost glowing across it.

“Combat training!”

“Sweet!”

“My blood is already pumping!”

“And to go with that are these!” All Might whirled and pointed at the wall opposite of the door, which slipped opened to reveal several boxes with numbers across them. “Costumes made based on your Quirk registrations and requests you sent in before school started. After you change, gather in Ground Beta!”

“Yes, sir!”

* * *

Itsuki pulled his belt into place and stood before the mirror in the men’s locker room to look over his costume. A pair of form-fitting pitch black pants with specialized guards, both colored to match the gold of his scales, woven above his shins and knees. He was barefoot, saurian feet free of restraint because the double standard of the law and public opinion differed between what the atypical citizen was required to wear and what a hero was allotted. Itsuki had gotten more than enough crap for going around barefoot when he was in middle school and he’d take every opportunity he could to feel the earth beneath his talons.

He wore a pitch-black combat-vest filled with a multitude of devices and implements with which to deliver first aid to any who needed it and was purposefully left open to expose his bare chest. Itsuki’s eyes narrowed and golden scales sprouted from beneath his flesh, covering him from the top of his golden locks to the bottom of his saurian feet. His arms lengthened slightly as did his neck while his tongue became long and forked inside his mouth. Three pairs of horns sprung forth and curled back along his skull finishing the “base” transformation though as always his arms trembled with the strain of holding back the full extent even at this tiny percentage. **Careful…**

He took a deep breath and let it out slowly, a hint of red shining in his eyes as a spark of electricity danced between his fangs for a moment. Tired of the familiar feeling of disgust at his own reflection, Itsuki used the mirror to discretely look over the rest of the guys in the room. While some were still garbing themselves in their hero costumes, Itsuki could tell that not a one of them was different from what That One had seen.

He looked over towards the one unknown in the group and blinked in surprise. Yōsei Kurokage’s outfit was familiar both to Itsuki and That One. Harkening to a design that had predated the dawn of Quirks many long years ago now, Kurokage’s costume was insect-like in design and colored in hues of silver. It was clearly meant to emulate the armor worn by those of the Kamen Rider franchise though it sported three distinctions. A cape not unlike what was worn by British royalty rested upon Kurokage’s back and upon his brow, above the azure lenses that emulated his eyes, was a crown of beetle-like horns. Last but certainly not least were his arms, which Itsuki could now see clearly he had two pairs of.

With his upper hands clasped over the lower pair, Kurokage looked like he had the normal singular pair of limbs and appropriate number of fingers as well. The only reason Itsuki even noticed at all was that he had been watching Kurokage as he brought his limbs together with a small click of carefully hidden mechanisms. As though sensing the eyes upon him, Kurokage looked up at Itsuki, his expression hidden beneath his mask before departing the locker room.

 _As if it wasn’t difficult enough to get a read on that guy…_ Itsuki shook his head and made to follow after him when he caught sight of Izuku slipping on the last of his costume, a pair of gloves that looked far too professional for the boy to have been able to afford himself. On the back of the gloves were the words “Plus” and “ULTRA!” respectively. A slight deviation but…

 _A good one I think._ Itsuki smiled. “Nice gloves.”

“Huh?! O-Oh, yeah, thank you!”

* * *

Ground Beta. Yet another cityscape like those utilized for the practical exams save that these building were furnished with a multitude of cameras and microphones with basements geared to monitor and view the proceedings taking place in the floors above. Though many had gotten dressed quicker than others, the majority of the class reached the training grounds at the same time with only a few stragglers coming up from behind.

Itsuki stood at the forefront and spared a moment to look over the ladies and their costumes. Not a one of them different from what That One had seen and read, even Kodai. As for the others…

Katsura Mafune’s uniform was a near seamless bodysuit that was too dull to be compared to silver and yet just a bit too bright to considered grey. The areas of her body that were not covered, specifically her shoulders and thighs, were exposed to show not ordinary flesh but gears and metallic wiring. Her lower legs looked like they had been replaced with a pair of limbs that were two parts bendable alloy like those find on athletic runners, and highly mechanized engine ports.

About her wrists were large, cylindrical bullet chambers not unlike what could be found in 1920’s mafia-era guns. Above her breasts but just below the base of her neck, a blue crystalline object pierced through the veil of her costume, shining and pulsing to a rhythm not unlike that of a human heart.

Seeing her so exposed, Itsuki realized that Mafune’s limbs, her legs and arms alike, had been surgically removed and replaced. He had seen others with similar injury in his brief stint in the hospital before he took to the streets. Many of his peers had also noticed and had unconsciously taken further steps away from her, the ancient and long instilled stigma of separating one’s self from that which did not fit the “standard” of normalcy even if such a thing was by no fault of the person’s own.

In point of fact, the only ones who had chosen to stand within arm’s reach of the girl were, unsurprisingly, Ochaco and Tenya. For the youngest member of the illustrious Iida family, it probably hadn’t truly struck him that Mafune’s limbs were not a result of a mutation Quirk like his. For Ochaco… Well, her family worked in construction and as dangerous and thankless a job as that is it wasn’t exactly uncommon to see the results of accidents and those that strived to work despite the losses.

Sighing, Itsuki drew his eyes towards Fumiko Sato and—

Itsuki blinked and tilted his head.

He blinked again, tilting his head the other way.

No, what he was seeing was still there.

Fumiko Sato’s heroic uniform consisted of a pair of large, white baggy pants with the cuffs tapped tightly to her ankles, iron-tipped shoes with a small, spiked heel beneath them. Black arm sleeves held tightly to her wrists and upper arms by golden rings. She wasn’t wearing her glasses though Itsuki guessed she either only needed them for lessons or had simply put on contact lenses in their place. A thin utility belt hung around her waist, likely filled with various sugary implements for her Quirk, and a black tube top clung tightly to her chest in a ridiculously form fitting degree.

 _Can she even breathe with that on?_ **... Wait, are we breathing? Damn it all, not again.**

He took a deep breath and loosed it in a quiet sigh. For some reason that he couldn’t quite place, Itsuki had a strange sense of déjà vu when he saw her in that attire. Like she was dressed as someone That One had known but was missing something to complete the look. It was akin to seeing Batman without his cape and cowl, Captain America without his shield, or Eraserhead actually smiling with glee.

Looking away lest she catch his staring, Itsuki found Tiffany Zumwalt standing out like a sore thumb amongst the sea of costumed heroes-in-training. For while Itsuki mentally referred to hero costumes as uniforms, Tiffany Zumwalt’s was the only one that well and truly deserved to be known as such.

Her “costume” was, in essence, a stylistic throwback to the military dress uniform of Germany’s soldiers back in one of the first two World Wars. The first one if Itsuki had to wager a guess though ancient history was not really his, or That One’s, strongest suit. Knee high black boots that gleamed, the uniform itself primarily a dark charcoal gray with the inner lining a dark crimson. Her dress shirt was a duller shade of red whilst her tie and gloves were both a stark white. She had traded out her glasses for a pair of prescription sunglasses that didn’t quite match the theme of her uniform, looking a tad more modern in design and make.

Hanging loosely off her shoulders was a black military trench coat, with the same dark red inner lining as her uniform, and was also clearly a size or two too large for Zumwalt, looking more like a bulky cape than a jacket. Her military cap bore not the symbol of Germany or Japan. Instead, it bore a pair of wings outstretched from what looked like an amalgamation of the Christian cross and a sword in its sheath. The same symbol also adorned the red band around her upper left arm.

He had guessed that she bore some German heritage given her name and slight accent when she spoke, but Itsuki hadn’t expected such a costume design from a girl who was now looking at him at this very moment apparently. He offered her a small smile and nodded his head in what he hoped conveyed his approval. She offered a smile of her own and…

 _Gods. Damn it._

Tiffany Zumwalt, dressed to the nines and fit for a visit to the Prime Minister of Japan and the Chancellor of Germany both and she gives him the gods-be-damned Vulcan salute.

 _She’s doing this on purpose._

A polite, if slightly exaggerated, cough turned everyone’s attention to All Might. “Now, it’s time for combat training!”

“Sensei!” Tenya hastily raised a hand. “This is a battle center not unlike those from the entrance exam, so will we be conducting urban battles again?”

“Nope!” declared All Might with a slight pop. He held up two fingers. “Today we are moving you two steps ahead of the game! Most of the time, fights with villains do take place outside in areas such as this but if you compare the numbers, logistics show that fights taking place indoors have a much higher rate. Backroom deals, attempted crimes in progress, even the middle of a relaxing night at a local bar and grill—truly intelligent villains always hide in the shadows even an age of heroes such as this one.”

All Might looked over the class, still smiling widely and proudly.

“For today’s lesson, you’ll be split into teams of two, one composed of villains and another of heroes, and fight indoor battles.

“Without basic training?” asked Tsuyu, tapping her chin in concern.

“This is a real battle to understand those basics!” declared All Might. “As much as you might try and prepare yourselves otherwise, you never know whom you may end up fighting with and against! You won’t always have the luxury to wait and learn of your allies strengths and your enemies weaknesses!”

“How will wins and losses be determined?” asked Yaoyorozu with a polite raise of her hand.

“Can we beat them up either way?” grunted Bakugo with a sneer.

“Will the punishment be expulsion like with Aizawa-sensei?” worried Ochaco, fiddling with her gloveless fingers.

“How shall we be split up?” inquired Tenya, armored hand upraised in his atypical robotic fashion.

“What does man love more than life, fear more than death or mortal strife? What the poor have, the rich require, and what contented men desire? What the miser spends, and the spendthrift saves, and all men carry to their graves?” Everyone, All Might included, turned and stared at a completely indifferent Itsuki, who stood with arms crossed over his bare chest. “No, really.”

“I’ll answer all of your questions!” All Might declared with clenched fist and sweat dotting his brow. He went to explain the rules of the indoor battles, that the heroes could win either by securing the “bomb” that the villain team was protecting or by securing any of the villains before the time ran out. The villains could likewise win so long as they get their bomb out of the heroes’ grasp or took them out themselves. Teams would be drawn by lots, what side they played also similarly divided, and lastly…

“No, no, young Uraraka, I shall not be so strict on your second day!” All Might laughed before pointing at Itsuki. “As for you, young Marumaru! The answer is nothing!”

Itsuki blinked, not having expected All Might to actually answer. Honestly, he just felt like joining in on the unintended joke. Still, he nodded. “Correct.”

“Hahaha!”

Names were drawn and teams divided rather promptly. Whether by some tangled skein of fate or the mysterious writings of destiny, some teams were as they had been when That One had first seen them whilst others were changed quite drastically. Tsuyu and Tokoyami were still partnered together, which in itself brought a small smile to Itsuki’s face, whilst Bakugo got Tiffany as his partner much to the former’s disgust and the latter’s disappointment.

Then there was Itsuki’s own partner who shuffled over to his side with a nervous wave and a twitchy smile hidden beneath a, rather ridiculous, face-mask that did not so much inspire one to smile in kind but to run fast and far, far away.

From there, things got both better and worse. Better in that contrary to how That One had seen it, Team G, otherwise known as Itsuki Marumaru and Izuku Midoriya, did not end up first on the metaphorical chopping block. In point of fact, they didn’t go second nor did they go third or even fourth. They were last. This in itself was what made things both worse and better.

For the latter, it was a means of studying the Quirks of the mysteries of the class with the added bonus of having a Quirk obsessed genius muttering away at his side. Izuku had a lot to offer on the applications and weaknesses of a lot of their classmates’ Quirks never mind those that were literal unknowns to That One.

Yet, when the fourth “round” had begun, Izuku had ceased his mutterings and instead had begun to slowly tremble in earnest and with good reason. By process of elimination, their opponents were none other than Team B, otherwise known as Tiffany Zumwalt and Katsuki Bakugo.

Zumwalt at least had the courtesy to focus on the match-up playing out on the monitors before them whereas Bakugo’s heated glare seemed torn between Izuku and Itsuki with only the occasional glance at the screens. This was where the worse part of the equation had come to play. As the powers and prowess of their peers played out right in front of their eyes, Bakugo’s pride had taken substantial damage as he saw for himself the prowess and powers of his peers.

It wouldn’t be a fight to prove his dominance over Izuku, to try and beat the so-called “truth” out of him, and to make it a point that he, Katsuki Bakugo, would be the next number one. Rather, it was that but in reverse order. Now, having seen for himself the strength that surrounded him, the casual ease that many of his classmates had demonstrated in their victories over opponents that were arguably their equal or better…

Short of direct interference from the man himself, not even All Might could dissuade Bakugo from utilizing every bit of his Quirk with reckless abandon if given the chance.

Itsuki didn’t smile. He bared his teeth.

 _Let’s see if you are everything That One had seen, Bakugo. Show me what kind of villain you can be._ **Do try and at least not make it easy.**

* * *

By good fortune or the tangled skeins of fate, Itsuki and Izuku found themselves standing before a very familiar building, at least to the likes of Itsuki. If Bakugo stayed true to character, he would not be content to simply wait for either Izuku or Itsuki to come to him, meaning that the bomb and his partner would be left on their own several floors up. Several floors up that happened to be one of the few that sported an alternate means of entry, at least for the likes of someone of a more… monstrous persuasion.

Itsuki looked down at his partner and saw that for all that his eyes were trained on the sheet of paper depicting the building’s interior in great detail, Izuku’s eyes were looking at something only he could see. For all that he could lie to himself and to everyone else who had the heart to ask, Izuku knew down to the very depths of his soul that Bakugo could embrace the role of a villain with far too frightening ease, especially if his adversary happened to be none other than poor, Quirkless—

“Deku.”

“H-Huh?!” Izuku nearly jumped out of his skin, startled out of his mind by Itsuki’s sudden interruption.

“Deku,” he repeated, tails weaving behind him in an almost hypnotic dance. “Once upon a time, it was only the name of a type of wooden doll that is made without arms or legs. Eventually it became an insult for someone who is “useless and can’t do anything.” But that one girl… Ochacho-chan wasn’t it? She had a different interpretation altogether… Didn’t she?”

“Dekiru…”

“Can do.” Itsuki nodded. “From all accounts, you saved her during the exam didn’t you? In that moment, you became not merely a hero but _her_ hero.” He loosed a slow, almost hissing, sigh. “Hope, I had said, is always the first thing to die but faith? Ah, now that is something much harder to destroy. It takes serious effort to destroy something so resilient as that, so I’ll ask you this right here and now partner of mine. Will you let her faith in you be broken?”

Itsuki held out his hand in a fist towards Izuku.

The ninth inheritor of One For All stared at the proffered hand, idly noting that sometime during his speech, Itsuki had reverted back to his mostly human form. Slowly, a smile started to blossom on Izuku’s face before blooming fully into a beam the likes of which were rather reminiscent of another, far more seasoned, hero. He met Itsuki’s bare fist with his gloved one in a gentle bump.

“Let’s do this!”

Itsuki smiled, “Right, so, let’s not beat around the bush with this. Between the two of us, who do you think Bakugo is likely to go after more?”

Izuku didn’t have to think about that. “Me. I mean, yeah, you did beat him—”

“Twice if you include Aizawa-sensei’s test.” **Soon to be thrice…**

Izuku grimaced and reconsidered for a brief moment but the answer remained obvious. “Yeah, but, Kacchan and I… there’s…”

“History.” Itsuki supplied, scales sprouting up from beneath his skin as he slowly swelled in size to stand in his “base” form once more.

“… Yeah, something like that…”

“Hm.” Itsuki tapped his chin with a claw as he looked up at the windows of the building. “Leaving Zumwalt alone with the bomb.”

“Don’t underestimate her, her Quirk is incredibly strong. It’s called Absolute Territory and it deserves that name.” **Absolute… WHAT?**

Itsuki paused and slowly looked over at Izuku with an unreadable expression on his face, his right hand clenching and unclenching going completely unnoticed by either of them. “Does it now?”

Izuku nodded. “So long as she has that field up, she’s untouchable. Not even Kacchan can break it!”

Itsuki’s tails, if anything, started to rattle even faster now as his frown slowly changed to something else. Something that involved far more fangs than show have been possible, even for a mouth shaped like a dragon’s own. His right hand snapped into a tightly clenched fist. “It’s decided then. You will handle your rival whilst I go and introduce myself to mine.”

“Wait, what?”

 _“Team G and Team J! Your preparation time is over! It’s time to begin your combat training!”_ With a short blare of a klaxon, the countdown had begun.

Itsuki reached over and ruffled the hooded mask atop Izuku’s head. “Good luck, Izuku Midoriya and remember what I said about hope and faith.”

Faster than Izuku could blink, Itsuki had raced for the building and started scaling the outer wall, claws digging into the masonry with ease. He swiftly disappeared around a corner and into the shadows of the alleyway. Izuku stared dumbly after him for a moment before shaking his head firmly and making his way into the building at a more sedate pace. He had no doubt that Kacchan would come to him and it wouldn’t do to waste his energy racing his way towards his oldest childhood friend.

Izuku felt the familiar feeling of trepidation in his heart as he always did whenever he and Kacchan were about to confront each other but now, after so many years, there was something new residing deep down within his chest. Something that in all his years of being a follower, of always cowering in the face of confrontation, was buried and forgotten since that day so long ago when his hopes and his aspirations were shattered by a doctor with well practiced indifference. So foreign was this feeling dwelling within his heart that Izuku Midoriya honestly had no name for it but to those who took to the battlefields gladly and with great relish, they knew it well, quite well indeed.

Anticipation.


	5. EPISODE 4.0: Live to Win

_Frustrated, degraded, down before you're done… Rejection, depression, can't get what you want…  
You ask me how I make my way? You ask me everywhere and why?  
You hang on every word I say… but the truth sounds like a lie…_

The urge to fight, the need for combat, the desire to prove one's dominance over another, has been an ingrained instinct several untold millennia old and one that will never fade no matter how tamed life can become. The emergence of Quirks proved that for all that humanity has come far as being the dominant life form on Earth, it can and will always return to its baser instincts when presented the opportunity. It was not a World War what had eventually erupted because a war implies it was a fight between nations, between ideals, and such a thing was not what truly occurred no matter what the history books say.

Quirks for all that they've become a standard amongst the populace are a mere five generations old. On average, the timeframe of a generation is considered to last roughly twenty-five years, meaning that for those young and impressionable minds in Class 1-A and Class 1-B, Quirks have only been around for a little over a hundred-and-thirty years at minimum as aside from the so-called "Child of Light," most of the first generation did not get the chance to truly make their mark on the world.

Most…

No, that glory of the battlefield fell to those of the second and third generations and the resultant chaos still lingers to this very day. In the face of absurdity, humanity does its best to adopt some sense of normalcy, something both conceivable and recognizable, in their drastically changed worldview. It was how Heroes and Villains came to be after all though not without a great many trials and tribulations along the way like the infamous Tokyo Incident.

Many were the conflicts and battles that arose across the world in those early generations. Yet it was in the fourth generation that the maps truly needed to be remade and an entire city reconstructed from the ground up. A calamity of epic proportions, a disaster unlike anything the world had ever seen before or since, but for one of the few survivors of that gods-forsaken day it was something else entirely.

It was a beginning.

Itsuki's first memory, one that he could truly call his own and not That One's, was of destruction and death. Buildings standing sundered and falling at the slightest touch, rain falling in thick sheets whilst lightning crashed harsh and cruel overhead. In the distance, a shadow, large as life and twice as powerful, screamed its fury to the heavens.

He had been lying on his back, scales erupting and sheathing over his flesh as his mind whirled with memories not his own, ideas and concepts both foreign and familiar assaulting him from all sides before he fell to blissful unconsciousness. When next he awoke, it was in a hospital. It took him days, or so the nurses said, for him to wake and in that time, his mind had slowly begun to settle and over the years since that day, he had come to answer those inexhaustible questions of what, where, and when.

How and why, even to this day, continued to elude him.

As to who…

Well, ask those who knew him by name they'd tell you he is Itsuki Marumaru, a student currently attending the hero course at the illustrious institution of U.A. High School. If you sought to find those whom dared to fight him because they thought themselves his superior or to take what little he had, be they villainous or otherwise, they'd give you an entirely different answer but one they all shared regardless.

A monster.

* * *

Standing with her back resting against the faux nuclear bomb and hands resting in the pockets of her pants, Tiffany Zumwalt watched her partner pace back and forth like an agitated animal freshly caged. The image was further reinforced by the fact that most of Bakugo's grumblings consisted of guttural growls than actual words and his teeth constantly gnashed each other in a ferocious sneer. While Tiffany liked to think herself as being quite smart, it didn't take a genius to know the source of Bakugo's agitation.

"Tell me Katsushit, which fact is infuriating you more? That Midori-chan managed to get in to U.A. or that he actually has a Quirk?"

Bakugo stopped dead in his tracks, back to her and shoulders trembling as his fists clenched tightly. The gauntlets flashed red as nitroglycerin poured into them. When he at last spoke, it was a quiet whisper that to anyone who knew him, and plenty more who didn't, would have been rightfully afraid for their continued wellbeing. "Did you know?"

Tiffany was not most people however and while she kept her face carefully schooled in a neutral mask of indifference, she couldn't help but cross her arms under her chest and look away towards the nearby window. "No."

"Then why the FUCK aren't you just as pissed off about this as me?!" Bakugo demanded, whirling around to face her. "He LIED! All this time he's been nothing but a treacherous little snake!"

Blinking, Tiffany tilted her head at Bakugo so that her crimson eyes peered over the lenses of her specialized sunglasses. "Because unlike you, I can see what's obviously right in front of me, Katsushit? Didn't you see what Midori-chan did to himself just by throwing a ball? He shattered every bone in one finger to such a degree that if it weren't for Recovery Girl, he'd likely not even _have_ that finger to use for several months _at best_. If that's what he could do to himself, imagine what he could do if he actually stopped taking your bullshit."

Her words served to only infuriate Bakugo further and with a sound that was equal parts guttural growl and vitriolic cursing, he stormed off and through the door. Tiffany watched him go without protest and loosed a quiet sigh as she turned her head up at the ceiling though her gaze was elsewhere. "Give him hell, Midori-chan. He deserves it."

* * *

Izuku paused in his near silent tread, head turning just slightly around the corner and loosing another silent sigh. Whether it was one born from relief or disappointment he couldn't quite say. Every step he took, the further he was drawn in to a field of emotion he was not wholly prepared for. Despite all the training he had undergone, Izuku had no true combative experience and realistically speaking the one and only time he had actually thrown a punch had been with the zero-pointer. Admittedly, he obliterated that mega-machine's head clean off but that move had shattered both his legs and arm.

Such a price against a mindless automaton, one admittedly built at ridiculous proportions, was one that Izuku was willing to pay both then and now. Whatever the results of them on his person, his actions had resulted in the continued wellbeing of someone, of saving someone. Even if that same someone ended up saving him in kind almost immediately after with a none-too-gentle slap to the face but still, he was going somewhere with this…

Oh, yes, so, against a giant automaton, one arm and both his legs.

_Against Kacchan…?_

Unnoticed by Izuku, his hands clenched into a pair of tight fists.

Izuku was not a fighter nor was he at the same stage of familiarity and practice with his Quirk as anyone else his age would be. Kacchan had skill with his Quirk and while no martial artist his fighting prowess was not something so easily brushed aside! What honest hope did he have in defeating—

"DEKU!"

A familiar voice, an all-too-familiar title, and a frightening flare of familiar flame and sound. In another time, in another place, Izuku would have rightly stumbled back in a surprisingly good dodge away from the fury of his former friend because in another time and in another place, he was not alone. In those alternatives, he was with his partner, oft a girl but occasionally a fellow boy, and so he'd rather put himself between them and his volatile adversary each and every time across whole branches of the infinite tree.

Here and now?

He was alone.

Here and now, Izuku had no one to protect but himself.

Here and now, Deku had no one to fight for but himself.

A boot slid back, feet planting themselves in a firm stance as gloved hands reached up and clamped down on an unsuspecting Bakugo's gauntleted arm. Teeth grit themselves tightly as Izuku whirled in place, using Bakugo's own momentum against him and slamming his would-be assailant across the hall where his unexpected flight was further aided by his own explosive blast that had been intended for him to come crashing down upon Izuku's head. Uncontrolled, unexpected, and frankly unprepared for what had just transpired, Bakugo crashed into the wall and into an empty room.

Izuku stood, chest heaving with panting breath.

Three point forty-five seconds.

That was how long it was from initial lunge to powerful counter-throw.

Whether by instinct finely honed from years of exposure or something far more ingrained into the human psyche, Izuku had reacted swiftly and decisively in a way he had never done before. Standing where he was, heart going beating like a maniacal drum, and his mind racing at thrice that rapid pace, Izuku tried to rationalize what he had just done, or, more specifically, that sudden swelling of an emotion he was still struggling to name.

Lying on his back, staring numbly up at the ceiling, Bakugo tried to process what exactly had happened. He wasn't injured, the walls built surprisingly thin and easily destroyed, but the pains of his body had nothing to do with the state of his mind at that moment. His mind was stuck on a loop, trying and failing, to put to reason how and why he had ended up flat on his back and how Deku, _FUCKING DEKU_ , had managed the impossible.

_Did that—?!_

Of course, Deku being Izuku, had to just make an already precarious situation and make it far, far worse as his mouth, going for the gold ahead of his brain and his heart, raced on ahead of rational thought.

"Kacchan, are you alright?"

The answer to that question was a fairly obvious one in Bakugo's opinion.

"MOTHER FU—!"

* * *

All Might winced and casually lowered the volume down on his earpiece. Having only had the boy for all of a single afternoon, the Symbol of Peace was starting to suspect that Bakugo would need some lessons in proper decorum befitting a hero.

"Holy crap, did you see that throw?" Ashido gushed, bouncing on the tips of her toes. "I didn't think a wallflower like Midoriya had it in him!"

"I don't think he did either," Asui tapped her lip, "He looks about ready to throw up, kero."

"I think that has more to do with Bakugo's shameful display than anything else…" scowled Tenya Iida.

"Oh man, Bakugo is _pissed_." Sero whistled lowly.

"He does look like he's cussing up a storm," agreed Jiro.

"Affirmative." Mafune nodded. "Katsuki Bakugo is utilizing every known curse word in both the Japanese and English languages." She blinked and tilted her head slightly with a small frown, her unblinking eyes never leaving the monitor. "And one other language that I do not recognize."

"We are of the opinion that it's monkey. Given he throws so much shit." Kurokage explained.

"Go Deku!" cheered Uraraka, "Give him the ol' one-two!"

As Bakugo continued his slew of bad language, in ways that were as imaginative as they were disturbingly descriptive, All Might couldn't stop the thought of how kids of this generation were far more liberal in their use of foul words than those of his own. At the least they should be trying to utter it as quietly under their breath as possible!

* * *

"[Shit,]" Itsuki cursed quietly under his breath and in English no less. He turned his neck downward; draconic eyes gleaming as the vitriolic explosion, along with literal explosions, continued several floors down. "I didn't think he'd catch Izuku so quickly." **You know what this means…**

 _No choice then._ **Only the right one.**

Itsuki launched himself backwards off the wall and ricocheted himself off the neighboring wall. Back and forth he went, with steadily increasing speed as electricity arced brightly in his throat until he reached the top floor. With a thunderous explosion of lightning, he blasted away the wall and came flying in only to be nearly sent flying out with a resounding clang.

The talons of his feet just barely caught the edge of the floor, his clawed hands slamming down and through the floor. His twin tails slowly raised up behind him, bladed tips rattling loudly as he raised his horned head up high enough that their pointed tips just barely grazed the ceiling.

In front of him, just barely noticeable through the billowing cloud of dust, was Tiffany Zumwalt. She stood with a lone arm outstretched and her sunglasses gleaming. She and the bomb were entirely untouched by his sudden entrance, as was most of her side of the room.

Itsuki took a careful step to his left, tails still rattling behind him as he began a slow pace in front of Tiffany and the bomb, his eyes locked with her own and yet still seeing so much more in his peripherals. Some dust and debris had gone past the shield. Not a lot but enough to at least confirm that her so-called "Absolute Territory" was not without its flaws.

A shield's strength is only insurmountable until it is met with an even greater force or, in the case, circumvented.

Without warning, one of his tails lashed forward and was rebounded off with a more muted clang. It wasn't that hard a strike, a draconian love-tap more than anything, but it was not for the strength of her shield that Itsuki loosed such an attack in the first place. His other tail whipped forward and lashed lightly against the shield again, slightly higher and more to the right than his initial strike. The result was just the same.

Tiffany lowered her hand, slowly turning her head to face him though her hidden eyes remained locked in place and thus so too was the barrier between her and her adversary. Utilizing such a small percentage of her Quirk had its disadvantages. While it would be better to raise her Absolute Territory in full, it would only serve to protect her and not the bomb.

Such was the perhaps the greatest weakness of her Quirk. At its full power, it'd protect her from anything short of an act of God, but only herself and nothing –and no one– else outside her immediate grasp. Her Absolute Territory was not an exaggeration or pompous naming. From oxygen to a nuclear blast, anything and everything that was not upon her person were repelled back at terminal speeds.

"Funny, I thought you were someone that liked a challenge. What, too scared to try and take on Katsushit yourself?" She asked.

Itsuki smirked. "If you know him well enough to give him such a delightful title as that, then you know as well as I that nothing short of All Might himself will stop him from tracking down Izuku—"

The building trembled slightly with the sound of an explosion several floors down followed by an equally loud. _"Damn it!"_

Itsuki tilted his head, horns scraping lightly against the ceiling as his neck bent and curled with the motion. "—And try to beat him."

"Try?" Zumwalt shook her head. "Don't get me wrong, I want to see Katsushit get taken down a few pegs as much as… well, anyone who has had the misfortune of actually knowing him but do you really think someone like Midori-chan can actually beat him?"

 _No…_ **He won't win.**

 _But…_ **What?**

Itsuki smiled. "He might just surprise you."

* * *

Katsuki Bakugo was no stranger to anger. Rage, fury, and all that lay between… He was as intimately familiar with as a fish was to water. It was his go-to-response for most everything even the most basic of functions. Who else would actually scream hatefully at plaque whilst brushing their teeth? Much as his name, and his very Quirk, might suggest Katsuki Bakugo was not known for being quiet in his anger, subtle in his rage, or tranquil in his fury.

So for him to suddenly become both tranquil and quiet…

There had to be a reason.

In point of fact, there were two.

Izuku Midoriya and Itsuki Marumaru… _Talk about being fucking pretentious. "Last Hope," seriously what the goddamn shit is that? Fuck it, he's fucking Goldilocks_ …

Nickname decreed for the golden-scaled bastard, Bakugo continued to stalk through the halls of the building, intent on hunting down one of the two and proving his strength and power. That overblown reptile had beaten his score both at the entrance exam and that stupid apprehension test true but those offenses, whilst great as a mountain's peak, were as molehills to the tower of offenses made by one Izuku "Deku" Midoriya.

Besides, Bakugo hadn't exactly scored second or even third in that last one but even he could admit that it was damned impossible to beat a score of infinity or be as limber as that one pink-skinned, raccoon eyed girl apparently is. _Fuck was her name? Fuck it, Raccoon Eyes it is!_

Seriously, no one should be able to do what she did and smile during it.

…

Fuck, he lost his train of thought again.

…

Right, Goldilocks and that fucker Deku!

The former having beaten him twice already but the latter… Oh, what he had done—! Goldilocks didn't understand the status quo, was wholly unaware of his prowess and destiny to become the next Number One Hero, but Deku? _FUCKING DEKU?_

Deku had lied to him.

That was unforgiveable.

Because one little lie had made a mockery of everything that Bakugo had ever believed of himself and his self-proclaimed childhood friend. If Deku had a Quirk this whole time, that meant Deku wasn't useless. If he had been so strong this entire time, that meant Deku wasn't weak. If Deku wasn't useless or weak, then what was he?

_What am I?_

Bakugo turned the corner and found himself meeting the gaze of Deku who stood at the farthest end of the hall, capture tape clenched tightly between his gloved hands. For all that he had managed to knock the wind out of Bakugo's sails in their initial confrontation, Bakugo had given back far more than what he had received. Deku's stupid bunny-eared hood was nonexistent at this point and soot stained his costume in patches of black.

Again, Bakugo couldn't help but quietly ask what felt like the hundredth time but was in truth the third since the start of this mock battle between a villain and a hero, "Why won't you use your Quirk, Deku?"

Deku, the fucker, didn't answer though he pulled the capture tape tighter in his grasp.

"Is it because you think that you can win without using it? That you can beat me without even trying? Are you underestimating me, Deku?" Bakugo continued to speak in the same, quiet and calm tone. To someone like Deku who knew him to be everything opposite of quiet and calm, it sounded far more terrifying to hear than if he were enraged and screaming.

"I'm not scared of you anymore, Kacchan!" declared Deku.

Bakugo's eyes widened at that before they narrowed into thin, angry slits. An emotion, one all too familiar and still as revolting as ever, arose deep from within his chest and with practiced ease he pushed it down from whence it came. It didn't stop that stupid little voice that sounded exactly like his bitch of a partner had when they were kids.

_What kind of hero incites fear instead of inspiration? I'll tell you Katsushit because obviously you are too stupid to figure it out for yourself. It makes you a—_

"Deku…" Bakugo raised his right arm up, gauntlet heavy with its payload. "With all of your stalking, you know quite a lot about my Quirk, but do you have any idea what these gauntlets of mine can do?"

Bakugo clenched his fist and brought his arm down, pointing the silver chamber at Deku as he released the safety. The trigger popped out with a tiny click, the barrel alit with an inner flame to ignite the nitroglycerin stored within.

"Why don't you LET ME SHOW YOU?!"

* * *

"Gods-damn it!" Itsuki's fists bounced off the invisible barrier with enough force that he nearly toppled over backwards. As it was, most of the fingers in his hands would have broken were his scales not made of such hardy material. Resuming his pacing once more, and occasionally lashing out at the barrier with his tails, he took stock of the scene once more. Zumwalt's side of the room was pristine as it had ever been minus a few errant clouds of dust and debris from his earlier entrance. In stark contrast, his side looked like a warzone.

Dusted clouds of debris wafted in a thickening fog around him, the wall behind him was more of hole than an actual wall, and those that remained on either side of him were gouged by an errant swipe of his spiked tails. Wires lay open and exposed with one particular cord sparkling dangerously though the lights above them both continued to shine.

Not a once did the barrier give way nor could Itsuki find an opening that he could exploit. Zumwalt's field was as he thought it to be, octagonal in shape and massive in size. What few openings there were, he couldn't use to his benefit, at least not without giving away what he had managed to discern of her Quirk and force her to assume a different method of obstruction. For all that he knew, this was the first line of defensive barriers rather than the singular invisible shield he presumed it to be.

He had wanted a challenge, a fight that would actually last, but this wasn't what he had in mind. Oh yes, he was being challenged, far more with Zumwalt than he would have been with Bakugo, but this was far from an actual fight. Given how she had succeeded where he had failed in the ball throw, Itsuki had thought Zumwalt to be far more imaginative with her Quirk, but no. She defended and only defended and not once to the attack.

Because she couldn't or she wouldn't, Itsuki didn't care at this point because honestly? He was starting to get rather frustrated now.

"Y'know, this isn't the Wall of Jericho. My Quirk won't crumble so easily, Baka-Itsu." Tiffany Zumwalt calmly stated, ignoring the beads of sweat trailing unseen down the back of her neck as the strain of keeping a fraction of her Absolute Territory up for so long a time in a single place. "Why don't you just do yourself a favor and give up?"

Then she made her first, and perhaps most fatal, mistake.

She shot him the Vulcan salute once more.

There is a common practice in most visual medias, be they animated or live action, that partakes in a certain auditory gag. The sound of ambient musical being brought to a violent halt oft accompanied by the sound of a record player scratching. Such a sound would not be appropriate for what Itsuki was feeling at that exact moment. Not unless it was also accompanied with the noise of the record player and the table it had been resting upon being hurled out the nearest window.

The only outward sign to Itsuki's internal mental breakdown was the faint twitch of his left eye.

"You keep doing that gesture. It does not mean what you think it means." He stated with a calm serenity that didn't quite match up with the sheer intensity of his twin tails rattling at such speeds that they were actually blurring in place.

Tiffany blinked but did not waver in keeping a portion of her field up along with the salute and her teasing smile. "Oh? What do you think it means then?"

"It means…" he began in a low growl as electrical light started coursing along the generous length of his neck. "Dif-tor heh smusma!"

It was a great many combination of things that resulted in what happened. A metaphorical Rube Goldberg of incidents and happenstance that might have resulted in an entirely different conclusion if they hadn't all played out near simultaneously with each other. Farther below, just as he was pulling the trigger to his gauntlet, Bakugo heard the monstrous bellow from Itsuki with accompanying thunder of lightning and flinched in surprise. This in turn threw his carefully angled shot to go wider than he intended. In kind, Izuku, backed into a metaphorical corner with no where to dodge, his body moved entirely on its own, reacting to Marumaru's roar because he had mistakenly assumed it to be his adversary's weapon being unleashed.

Izuku's uppercut, quick and instinctual, was more than enough to create a massive updraft of air that sent Bakugo's blast veering upwards in a massive pillar of flame. The pillar, combined with the added torrent of air, speared its way upwards until it crashed up and through the top floor. Thankfully for both Itsuki and Tiffany, the blast had erupted on the section of floor between them that had been occupied by open air and one other thing.

The Absolute Territory of Tiffany Zumwalt boasted strength unrivaled but had never suffered a pincer of attacks from two different directions and of differing magnitudes of power. Freshly raised or better yet in its whole form, Zumwalt's Quirk would have held up, but like all Quirks that have come before and long after it, the strength of Absolute Territory was tied to its wielder. For all that Tiffany Zumwalt had trained and practiced with her Quirk, she, like most whom possessed a Quirk, was human.

She flinched and the barrier separating her from Itsuki shattered like glass. Itsuki's mouth snapped shut just as Bakugo's redirected attack burst forth through the ceiling, the rush of air nearly pushing him back whilst it sent an unprepared Tiffany flying back into the bomb. Though surprised by this sudden turn of events, Itsuki acted quickly, leaping across the ravine and bodily embracing the bomb with every limb that he could utilize.

A stunned moment passed for what felt like an eternity.

_"The Hero Team… WIIIIIIIINS!"_

At the first word from All Might, Itsuki dropped himself from the bomb and knelt down beside Tiffany. "You alright?"

She groaned and blearily blinked open her eyes and immediately winced, clenching them shut. "My head feels like a firecracker just went off inside it…"

 _Well, she's not wrong…_ Itsuki looked back at the gaping hole behind him. He turned his neck around and looked down at her. "Think you can hold onto me as I carry you out of here to Recovery Girl? I'm not an expert but I'm fairly certain you've got a concussion."

"Kann ich nicht einfach hier liegen und in Frieden sterben?" she groaned piteously in German, pressing a forearm against her eyes.

"Nicht heute." He answered her in kind.

She lowered her arm and started up at him over the rim of her sunglasses. "…Sie sprechen Deutsch?"

 _I do?_ **If we have to.**

"Jawohl."

"Heh… well aren't you just full of surprises…? Fine." She held her arms up as though she expected him to do something sensible like take her up within the coils of one of his two tails. Instead, he picked her up in a loose single-armed embrace, holding her up close to the base of his serpentine neck. Startled by the unexpected maneuver, she wrapped her arms tightly around the base of his neck. Satisfied that she was at least holding on tightly for him to feel it through his thick, golden scales, Itsuki stretched his neck out to look down into the hole. He could just make out the ground floor below and seeing no one in his intended landing zone called out.

"Look out below!"

He waited a moment, watching to see if either Bakugo or Izuku would be foolhardy enough to actually move into his path before he leapt down. For as heavy as he weighed, Itsuki landed lightly on his talons, the building barely trembling to the impact of his landing. He looked to his right and found Bakugo standing still as stone with an expression of shock and something like revulsion on his face. Itsuki twisted his neck to the left and saw a comatose Izuku lying with one arm now completely sleeveless and looking like every bone within it had been broken three times over.

"Gods-damn it Izuku…" He murmured quietly.

"Wha… What is…?" Tiffany looked down and her eyes widened. "Gott im Himmel!" She winced and clamped a hand down upon her forehead.

Itsuki reached out with his open hand and pierced through the concrete ground beneath Izuku. A moment of concentration and his fingers stretched out, claws piercing through the masonry as he carefully moved his hand around his comatose partner.

"There's no need for that young Marumaru." If Itsuki was at all surprised by All Might's sudden appearance behind Bakugo, neither he nor his fellow blonde showed it. Tiffany though repressed a girlish squeak lest she antagonize the pounding going on in her head. "Recovery Girl has been alerted and has dispatched a team of recovery droids—"

"With all due respect, sensei," Itsuki interrupted, continuing his careful work. "If we are to play this out as realistically as possible, the only possible help my partner would receive is from me and as we've yet to be trained in the medical arts, the best that I can do is get him to someone capable of treating him."

All Might paused and tilted his head as he took note of young Zumwalt still being held in Itsuki's other arm. "And young Zumwalt? She was your enemy."

"You're missing the most important part of that sentence, sensei." Itsuki grunted, carefully lifting up the slab of the floor he had carved out and the unconscious Izuku lying completely unawares of his impromptu stretcher. "What she was doesn't matter. What she is now, is someone who needs my help. What kind of hero would I be if I don't offer it?"

Carefully setting the stony stretcher down into the waiting coils of his tail, Itsuki readjusted his grip on Tiffany with a quiet murmur of apology before he started towards the building's exit and out of All Might's sight.

 _Well now…_ All Might smiled. _Seems that Midoriya-shonen isn't the only diamond in the rough after all…_

* * *

A tap of the mouse and the live video feed minimized out of sight. Nezu reclined back in his lush office chair behind his mahogany desk, padded fingers tapping together as he mentally reviewed all that he had witnessed thus far. It was something of a tradition amongst the Hero Courses in U.A. to have the first years jump into the metaphorical ocean to see whether they could sink or swim in far too many ways for a genius like Nezu to count.

Whilst Aizawa's little scare tactic of an opening exam oft displayed the ways that one could use their Quirk in situations they never could previously, the mock battles allowed them the chance to actual enact what had once could only be imagined. Then there was of course the psychological aspect of the mock battles. Fighting against those whom they knew nothing about in both motivation and methodology be they on the side of angels or coercing with demons, it didn't matter. Fighting the unknown tended to bring out the unknown of the individual, the part of themselves that not even they knew they had in their possession, and with which they could either achieve victory or at least ensure that their loss was as difficult as they could possibly make it.

Nezu, for all his genius, was not a trained psychologist. He was learned of the art as much as one of his intelligence could possibly be, but as anyone who saw him could plainly point out, he is first and foremost an animal. For all his smarts there were things about the human mind that just didn't quite click as it would for an actual human, at least not without a good cup of tea in paw and some to truly work out how so many squares could fit into a circle.

As always, there were some students that he'd make a note to Aizawa-kun to keep a closer eye on then most. Minor personality quirks that could lead to disaster further down the line if not corrected before it took root any further than it already had. One such example was in the heir of Endeavor. The boy was so dead-set on burying the portion of himself, of his very Quirk, that remotely resembled his father, Nezu wouldn't be surprised if the boy didn't show up in class one day dressed in black with dyed hair and facial piercings galore.

Then there was Yagi's successor, who was swiftly proving himself to be either incapable of considering his own well being over that of another's or was a budding masochist in the making. Only the second day of his schooling and Midoriya-kun had already needed Recovery Girl's Quirk three times, a new record undoubtedly and one Nezu looked forward to teasing the lad over in latter years whilst in safe distance away from Recovery Girl.

Of course, that was just taking the young lad at face value and not taking into consideration the matter of his parents' unique quirks both literal and figurative. As far as personality was concerned, young Midoriya took very little from his father. He was kind, earnest, shy to a fault, and seemed entirely incapable of having a conversation without stuttering over the occasional word. His kindness and constant need to self-sacrifice were likely a result from his mother though Nezu fervently hoped that was all that he had gotten from her.

The temper of Midoriya's father was the stuff of legends but his mother? That was what nightmares are made of.

Hopefully, by the time Recovery Girl notified her of what had happened to Midoriya-kun, Nezu would be long gone for the da—

His intercom beeped and his secretary's voice chimed with all the cheer of a child on sugar high but whose words rang like the tolling of a deathly bell to Nezu's ears. "There's a Mrs. Midoriya on the line for you, Sir!"

Nezu hastily pulled up the security cameras and saw a familiar old lady replacing her phone back into her medical coat and turn slowly, ever so slowly, to look up at the camera. That vicious, old hellion of a doctor then dared to not only smile like the kindly granny she most certainly was not but added insult to injury with a pair of fingers upraised in victory.

Nezu didn't know when, he most certainly did not know how, but somehow, someday, he'd get her back for this…

* * *

Itsuki walked side-by-side with Tiffany towards the locker rooms to change back into their school uniforms. A quick peck to the forehead had cleared up Tiffany's concussion in an instant though she was a slightly more tired now as a result. A small handful of the nurse's specially crafted gummies would help take the edge off for the remainder of the school day but the old nurse had urged the girl to have a full night's rest regardless. Izuku, sadly, would require more of her attention and, at best, he'd still be wearing a cast home.

Itsuki scratched at the back of his head, fingers trailing through the locks of his golden hair and feeling the strange sensation that always permeated his flesh whenever he resumed his humanoid form.

"Vulcan."

"Hrmm?" He looked back down at Tiffany and saw that she was looking up at him out the corner of her eyes, her specialized sunglasses replaced with her regular pair of spectacles.

"Earlier, before Katsushit messed up everything —which believe me I will be informing Izuku's mother about this shit show if the school hasn't already— you spoke in Vulcan. Dif-tor heh smusma, which means—"

"Live long and prosper, yes." Itsuki said with a confused tilt of his head. If she knew what that salute meant then why—

"Gott sei Dank habe ich endlich jemanden gefunden, der eigentlich kultiviert ist!" Much to Itsuki's surprise and mounting confusion, Tiffany leapt, actually leapt, for joy with a beaming smile.  
Itsuki blinked and confusedly asked, "What do you mean by cultured?"

"Do you have any idea how difficult it is to find anyone in Japan who actually knows what _Star Trek_ is? It's all _Star Wars_ here like you would not believe!"

So said the Germanic girl to the draconic boy currently residing in a district named Arkanis, which is but a mere kilometer away from one of the most wretched hives of scum and villainy That One knew of.

"I mean, don't get me wrong, I like _Star Wars_ too but it's like nobody here is aware of anything else in the Sci-Fi genre." She sighed. "I know it's classic literature but it's not ancient!"

It was quite fortunate that by that point in the conversation, Tiffany had taken a few steps ahead of Itsuki otherwise she would have laughed herself to tears at the expression on his face in that instant. Confusion, shock, and even a tiny dash of horror, before he schooled his features back into cool indifference while his mind was awhirl like the sea amidst a hurricane.

 _Classic literature?!_ If his thoughts were spoken aloud, Itsuki's voice would have been a high-pitched shriek capable of shattering glass. _Star Trek is classic literature here?!_

"I just realized, we never really introduced ourselves properly have we?" Tiffany stated more to herself than to Itsuki. She skipped a few steps ahead of him and offered her hand out to him with a beaming smile. "Guten Tag! Ich heiße Tiffany Zumwalt."

For all That One had given him, Itsuki still continued to find himself surprised by the kind of curveballs that life in general continued to throw at him. Yet, whereas those times that came before he had dropped if not outright lost entirely, he caught onto this one with a vice-like grip. He smiled and took her offered hand in his clawless one and gave it a hearty shake. "Grüß Gott. Ich heiße Itsuki Marumaru."

"So what other series do you like?" asked Tiffany as they resumed their walk.

"… _Animorphs_?" Itsuki winced. That sounded more like a question than an answer.

Thankfully, Tiffany didn't seem to notice and instead laughed once more, "I meant book series not television! But wow another classic example of sci-fi huh? Tell me, do you have all five seasons in individual boxes or did you manage to snag that collector's edition with the theatrical epilogue?"

Again, pure stupid luck spared Itsuki the mortification of Tiffany seeing his dumbfounded face.

 _What. The. FU—!_ **Distract her, before you make a greater fool out of us than you already have!**

Itsuki coughed, feigning clearing his throat before he asked, "Why Midoriya's mother instead of Bakugo's?"

"Well, between you, me, and anyone else I feel like telling, Katsushit is scared shitless of her. Don't really know why, she's such a sweetie really…"

* * *

Toshinori Yagi didn't know what was more worrying. That he had been called, quite literally, to the principal's office at the literal start of his teaching career, and right after a proper chewing out from the school nurse too, or that said principal looked… to put it bluntly, shell-shocked.

Nezu's fur was standing on end as though he had stuck a finger into an electrical sockets and for all that his mousey face was set in its atypical genial smile, his paws were trembling hard enough that his tea was nearly splashing out of its cup as the saucer beneath it rattled loudly against it.

"Yagi-kun. I will be perfectly blunt with you. Today, you, my dear boy, fucked up."

… Well if Yagi wasn't worried before, he certainly was now. _I didn't know that Nezu even knew how to swear…_

"True, a generous amount of blame can be laid upon Bakugo-kun, whom I expect both you and Aizawa-kun to collaborate on a suitable punishment for his actions and his clear refusal to adhere to what you, his teacher, told him explicitly NOT to do. Katsura-chan as well I'm afraid as we are not encouraging such actions among the student body no matter how deserving or undeserving they may or may not be through inaction on our parts—" Nezu took a sip of his tea.

 _Well… I'm impressed._ Toshinori coughed uncomfortably into his skeletally thin hand. _I didn't think anyone could speak so much in a single breath…_

Nezu continued right where he left off. "—but to get to the main reason that I have you here in my office telling you things that I am quite sure you are already quite aware that you should be doing—"

Toshinori hastily nodded, those sections in his teachers' guidebook having been read many times over and still riddled with sticky notes bookmarking the more important pages and passages from where it rested hidden in the pocket of his pants.

"Good, good, now, to the point of why I have you here Yagi-kun, I want to ask you something and I want you to answer me with the kind of honesty I know you are capable of when not being hounded by either the press or heroes outside your far-too-small circle of trusted allies and confidants."

Now well and truly dreading where this conversation was going, Toshinori nodded slowly. "Of course…"

"Do you know who Midoriya's parents are? His mother or his father?"

"Midoriya-shonen's parents?" Toshinori parroted, blinking owlishly. "I… only know that he lives with his mother and his father works abroad in… America I believe? I'm afraid such topics never really came up when we were training at Dagobah Beach…"

Nezu's trembling paws suddenly went still, the fur that once was raised so high slowly starting to lower with his cup of tea. The tiny mammal took a deep breath and slowly let it out in a tiny, rather cute, hiss of air.

"Do you mean to tell me that you, All Might, Symbol of Peace, 8th Successor of One For All, the Number One Hero in all of Japan, one who stands amongst the top triumvirate of Pro-Heroes in the entirety of the world, never once looked into your potential, and now literal, successor's family?"

When put like that, Toshinori felt every bit the elementary student he had been so many years ago. He tugged at one of his bangs, trying to find a suitable answer that didn't sound stupid, naïve, or some poor combination of the two, when Nezu started to tremble once more.

Before outright collapsing back into his chair as he positively _roared_ with laughter.

Formerly, Toshinori was mildly worried.

Now, he was outright terrified.

As quickly as it had begun, Nezu's maniacal laughter died down and he coughed politely into his paw, sat himself back up and straightened his tie. "Ah, thank you for that Yagi-kun. That was the sort of pick-me-up that I needed after the kind of conversation I just had." He clapped his paws together. "So, Mrs. Midoriya gave me a call—"

Toshinori sweat-dropped. _Wait are you just going to pretend that you didn't bust a gut just now?_

"And needless to say she is quite aware of what you have bestowed upon her son and I believe she has some words she'd like to express to the one who, and I quote her directly here, made a liar out of her sweet baby boy. In short, Yagi-kun, she wants to meet you for brunch at her residence before your co-training at the USJ. 9o'clock sharp. Do NOT be late."

"I—Wait, how—?"

"However, I am a fair and quite generous principal and while I do believe you completely and utterly deserving of the conversation you will be having with her, I will not send you into the metaphorical lion's den without a means of defending yourself, or rather, without knowing just who it is you are to be talking with."

Nezu reached into his back pocket and pulled out his wallet and pulled out a photograph. He looked at it for a moment, his rodent-like face unreadable as usual, before silently passing it along to Toshinori. The gaunt man took it with slightly trembling fingers, really it was his old injuries acting up and nothing else no matter what the principal might have thought, and took it up.

His eyes widened to comical proportions, "This…! This is—!"

* * *

Izuku Midoriya was numb both literally and figuratively. While Recovery Girl's Quirk was capable of rending him whole within moments, such a thing could only be done with the proper amount of stamina, which Izuku had been sorely lacking when he had been brought into her office. He'd need a good night's rest before seeing her in the morning to have his arm fully healed. As it was, he had been given a hefty amount of painkillers in the meantime hence the physical numbness and as to the figurative…

Well, he had undergone quite the emotional roller coaster with… God, what even was Kacchan anymore? Sure, they had been friends once when they were kids but could they even be described as former childhood friends if their friendship only lasted so short a time? Rivals maybe, or at least that's how Bakugo seemed to take the sudden shift of worldview. Not for the first time, Izuku felt the familiar agonizing weight of guilt settling in his gut. Izuku had never thought himself a good liar but if the past several weeks had proven anything, he was remarkably adept at it.

Such a thought really only served to numb him to such a point that Izuku wasn't even concerned about Aizawa-sensei being less-than-pleased with his absence for all of the afternoon classes. So it was with a heavy gut filled with guilt, and a body filled with enough painkillers that really he ought to be tasting colors by now, Izuku opened the door to what he had expected to be an empty classroom.

"Hey, there he is!"

So one can imagine his surprise to find that not only was the class still heavily occupied, a great number of his peers had been actively waiting for his return.

"Good work!" Kirishima grinned, pointed teeth flashing in a brilliant grin as he, Mina, Sero, and Fumiko crowded around him much to his surprise. "Man, I wish we could have heard what you and Bakugo were saying during your match! I bet it was burning just as brightly!"

"Man, I didn't expect you to fight so evenly with Bakugo given how high he scored on the entrance exam!" noted Sero.

"You were so good at dodging!" gushed Mina, pumping her fists excitedly.

"And tossing him like a ragdoll too at least at first," stated Fumiko, pressing her glasses up on her nose.

"Um…! Er…!" Izuku frantically looked around at the sea of faces crowding around him, actually praising him, and was at a complete and total loss as to what to do or say in this situation. Frankly, the only way it could get worse is if—

"Ah, Deku-kun! Didn't Recovery Girl heal your injuries?" Somehow, Uraraka-chan spontaneously developed a brand new Quirk. It was the only way that Izuku could explain how she not only appeared at the head of the pack surrounding him on all sides but with her face so close to his own that he felt that his own luminescent blush would give her first degree burns.

"Ah, oh, it-it's because of my stamina…" he started to answer when, at long last, he found his way out of this awkwardness that was suddenly his life right now. "Uh… whe-where's Kacchan?"

Fumiko snorted. "That foul-mouthed lout? Probably nursing his wounded pride somewhere after what Katsura-chan did to him."

"Wh-What?"

"Oh man, yeah, you totally missed it, right soon as All Might brought him down, she marched right up to him and slapped him a good one right across the face!" Sero snickered. "Pretty sure he's _still_ nursing that handprint!"

"She slapped him?" repeated Izuku. "Wh-Why would she—"

"I am afraid that I cannot answer that question, Izuku Midoriya," said Katsura as she walked up to the group, backpack on her back. "As it is of a personal nature not just to yourself but to Katsuki Bakugo as well. I can, at the least, impart that it primarily was a result of how I felt about his statement regarding your state of being in following the use of his then-untested equipment. I am to be told of my punishment in regards to my actions on the morrow alongside Katsuki Bakugo." She blinked. "Whatever the penalization I am to receive, it is an action that I can see myself repeating were time to be inexplicably rewound."

"… What?" Kirishima asked.

"It's between Bakugo and Midoriya, the lout ran his foul mouth off, the two of them will be given a punishment by Aizawa-sensei tomorrow, and if she had to do it again she'd do so regardless of the punishment." Fumiko answered.

"Correct." Katsura nodded. "A succinct summarization."

Tiffany smiled beautifully, hers the expression of pure innocence even as she spoke, "Honestly if she hadn't done it already I would done so too. Might still really with an added kick beneath the belt too."

"Ti-Tifa-chan, you promised—!" stuttered Izuku, looking equal parts pale and green as a long-buried memory resurfaced in his mind.

"I only said I wouldn't punch him there again Midori-chan. I never said anything about kicking."

Those of the male persuasion who were standing close to Tiffany, and distinctly recalled the iron tips of her heroic boots, took a collectively large step back from her. Save for one.

"Alright, this I have GOT to hear." Itsuki smiled down at Tiffany, sitting back on a desk and completely ignoring Tenya's offended expression, as he regarded her. "What did he do to deserve that and how high a pitch did he reach afterwards? Better yet, do you have pictures?"

"Süsser, I'm on a first-name basis with both of their mothers. I've got ALL the pictures." She looked up at Itsuki over the rim of her glasses before she turned her red eyes towards Izuku and smiled. "Including those during a time where a certain someone was absolutely adamant about wearing a particular set of pajamas 24/7 when they were four."

"You've more pictures of Chibi-Deku-chan?!" Ochaco gasped delightedly, she and Mina both clapping their hands excitedly. Katsura, who had been halfway out the door, immediately turned herself right around and primly took a seat. As for Izuku… The poor boy's face had gone full nuclear meltdown as he put two and two together and got: _OH GOD NO!_

Izuku ended spending the remainder of his time trying to stop Tiffany from showing off the more embarrassing pictures and videos that she had in her possession. He succeeded in at least maintaining some small sliver of his dignity. Poor lad totally missed the silent texts being tossed about with promises of pictures and videos to certain… Let's just call them interested parties. Either way, by the time Izuku remembered Kacchan…

The boy was long gone for home with no one to speak to him, to alleviate for him however lightly or unwantedly, of the frustrations and worries he had laid down upon himself. Not his ideal hero All Might and most certainly not that useless Deku, Izuku Midoriya. Bakugo for perhaps the first time in his life of having always been followed now found himself walking alone with only his own thoughts to accompany him.


	6. EPISODE 5.0: Good to Be Alive

_When all you've got are broken dreams…  
Just need a second chance and everything you want to be gets taken from your hands…_

  
No. 13 remembered that day. They doubted that any hero who had been present would ever forget it really. That day, so many years ago, when most of Tokyo was leveled and what few towers remained standing stood broken and in flames even as rain continued to pour from the sky as though the heavens themselves were weeping. Bodies littering the streets, so many countless corpses little more than burnt husks and those that weren’t were hardly the better for it. Those precious few that were merely injured were lucky to be alive and few of them were left whole when all was said and done. Limbs lost, bodies scarred horribly… many of the living did not stay so for long by their own choice in the weeks following that day, their losses too great and too many to count.

The bureaucrats and pencil pushers, the news reporters and other such media, they labeled it “the Tokyo Incident.” Thirteen knew it by a better name: a Hellish Nightmare.

Thirteen had frequently been labeled as a rescue hero before but it was on that day they had become the very dictionary definition of the term. They had cleared the debris, helped carry the injured and the dead alike, and had stood at the forefront of the crowd when the instigator of this nightmare stepped forth with head held high and nary a twitch of regret upon his face for what his actions had wrought.

Tartarus should have become his place of residence, buried and forgotten like the other evils already condemned to its halls, but for reasons never explained but to a select few, that man, that _monster_ , had been allowed his freedom under the strictest of conditions. Whatever had transpired behind those close doors no one but those present knew and not a one of them dared to speak of it in public or in private but Thirteen was not stupid nor were they a fool.

In the months that followed, a new system had been instigated, one that only a select few heroes could ever know about let alone enact in full. Up until that day, that damnable day, Quirks had been divided into three types. Emitter. Transformation. Mutation.

Now there was a fourth.

When Thirteen had first been informed of it, they had thought it so created because of that monster, that horrible, awful man who sundered Tokyo and slew countless people dead with his actions.

They had been wrong.

So. Very. Wrong…

Thirteen shook their head and looked over their computer tablet once more, checking over the various systems and machinations that ran the USJ. Today, Class 1-A was to begin their first day of rescue training and Thirteen wanted to be as concise as possible when teaching them. Their eyes wondered away once more, drifting to the scattering of half-crumbled buildings and beneath their suit, they loosed a long, trembling breath before focusing once more on the task at hand.

… The students liked to make heart of Thirteen’s pride and joy, the Unforeseen Simulation Joint. Like to secretly point the parallels between it and a certain theme park bearing a similar acronym. They couldn’t know that it had been intentional, to try and make light of a place that simulated the darkest day in No. 13’s life. To not scar them as No. 13 had been scarred on that day so many years ago. There was a reason, after all, that they chose to wear their full suit at all times of the day. A reason that had nothing to do with their Quirk…

Though it never permeated the air as it had once before, they simply could not stop smelling it…

That godforsaken stench of death…

* * *

  
As always, dawn found itself staring down at the lethargic form of one Itsuki Marumaru lying spread-eagled on the rooftop of his current abode. Though there were faster, and frankly far easier, methods of regaining his energy, absorbing the natural radiations of the sun was something that had become as second-nature as breathing to him since he first awoke at that hospital so many years ago.

That and considering the last time he tried one of those other methods, all of Wakkanai had been without power for over a week and to this day there were still rumors of a raijū roaming the countryside.

Not an experience that Itsuki wanted to repeat anytime soon. **Not when it is unneeded.**

Breakfast, contrary to his usual meal, actually consisted of leftovers from yesterday’s lunch and what few food scraps he managed to secret away in his pack. A delightful change as most mornings either consisted of no breakfast at all or a meal of heavily charred pigeon, rat, or some combination of the two. Using a shattered window to see his reflection and deciding once more there was no hope for his mane of hair, Itsuki set off for U.A., traversing the rooftops of the Arkanis district to better avoid those who were either scum or downtrodden.

Fortunately, such early hours found little of either and once he reached the more respectable, or rather the more protected, portions of the city, Itsuki leapt for the ground below and continued his brisk walk towards U.A. High. Though only a few days into the school year, Itsuki had yet to find anyone else arriving on the grounds before himself, leaving him time to traverse the transient memories of That One and compare what could have been to what actually was. This morning though, Itsuki found that he had found an entire crowd awaiting him at the gates of the school.

Something far worse than the pimps, the drug-dealers, and other assorted small-time crooks that infested the district he called his place of residence.

Reporters.

_Truly, there is no greater evil than them._ **Wrong. So. Very. Wrong. **

Itsuki thought to try his luck at scaling the wall regardless of whatever defenses U.A. had secretly erected but it was too late. One lone camerawoman spotted him and like a pack of starving dogs gifted with a juicy steak, the horde of reporters was upon him.

It was everything That One had ever witnessed and more besides. Microphones shoved in his face, camera lenses flashing and glinting brightly in his eyes, reporters trying and failing to speak over one another in their frenzied attempt at getting an answer to their questions no matter how sensible or ridiculous they might be.

So Itsuki did the only thing he thought he could do.

He answered their questions with questions of his own.

“Do you know that if you prepare them properly beforehand, rats can actually be quite delicious to eat? Of course, you got to prepare them just right otherwise you run the risk of ingesting some pretty nasty pathogens. Still, they got a rather distinct flavor to them, gamey and quit pungent.” Itsuki didn’t smile. He showed his teeth.

“I-I see…” The reporter looked very much like she didn’t really want to. “But… about All Might?”

“Same with pigeons and if you can find a nest of them, their eggs aren’t that different from chicken really though you’ll need to raid quite a few nests to make a substantial meal out of them.” Itsuki licked his lips, tongue long and forked like a snake’s.

“A… About All…”

“Spiders are pretty good too if you’re alright with the crunch. Just a little bit of salt, a touch of garlic, and presto! Now, you might expect them to be crispy on the outside and gooey in the middle, and trust me, you’d be right on the money there. The legs are quite crunchy but the head and body? There’s where the white meat resides. Rather like a cross between chicken and cod.”

“Urgh…”

“Oh, oh, but the best kind of food has to be cockroach! Do you know how many ways there are to prepare a good cockroach? You can toast them, fry them, sauté, or boil them! Weirdly enough, they always have a taste and texture not unlike really greasy chicken no matter how you prepare them…”

By this point, more than a few reporters and their respected camera crews were turning some interesting shades of green and the reporter that Itsuki was speaking to directly looked like she was about to—

“Blaugh!”

Needless to say, the janitorial droids had their work cut out for them.

* * *

  
Aizawa overlooked his class with his usual lethargic stare. A good chunk of his students had been lucky enough to arrive long after the… cleanup and those that didn’t no longer looked like they were going to make a rendition of that mess in his classroom. The perpetrator sat back straight and eyes forward though there was a devilish gleam in his hellion eyes—

Aizawa sighed and took another long draught of his juice to try and rid his tongue the flavor of his morning brew that was, once again, soiled by the foul sweetness of sugar and cream. _Damn you Mic…_

“Good work on yesterday’s combat training. I saw the videos and the results.” His eyes narrowed and he turned his gaze to one of his two more troublesome students. “Bakugo, you’re talented but if you continue to act like a child you will be treated as one. Starting today until the end of the week you will be serving detention with Power Loader.”

Bakugo bit his lower lip hard enough to nearly draw blood as he glared down at his desk. “Right…”

Aizawa stared at him for a moment more before turning his attention to the last troublemaker. “Mafune, you’ll also be serving detention for the remainder of the week but with Midnight.”

“Affirmative.” Emotionless as ever though Aizawa detected a faint hint of betrayal in her tone and so Aizawa contained his bemused smirk behind another sip of his juice pack. Really, it was more a punishment for Midnight to have to suffer dealing with a female student but one that, like many others, was clearly not a fan.

“Midoriya.” The boy flinched, not expecting to be called upon and likely fearing that he too would be serving time after classes. Aizawa, veteran that he was in the art of punishment, allowed that thought to stew in the boy’s head a moment longer than necessary. “Once more, you settled with breaking your arm again. The excuse of you being unable to help it is getting old. I don’t like repeating myself so don’t make me do so again. Are we clear?”

“Y-Yes!”

“Good. Once you get a handle on your Quirk, it’ll prove itself more yourself to you and others so try and feel a sense of urgency, Midoriya.” Backhanded compliment delivered, Aizawa turned his attention to the whole class. “Now, let’s get down to actual homeroom business. Today, we take another step towards deciding your future…” Aizawa took a sip of his juice.

Many students sat on the edge of their seat in frankly well deserved worry. _Another test?!_

Aizawa finished his drink with one final, drawn-out slurp. “… By deciding on a class representative.”

Those same students sat back with a sigh. _It’s a normal school activity!_

Then Aizawa’s words sunk in and well…

“Pick me! I want to be class rep!”

“I’ll do it!”

“Yeah, you’re going to need me.”

“I’m totally the right pick!”

Madness ensued.

Itsuki, having had enough with dealing with such degenerate behavior once already this morning, rose to his feet with a loud, “Enough!” ** There can only be one King. **

Everyone turned to him, those most vocal ready to launch a retaliatory rebuke but were immediately cowed when they caught sight of his luminous glare.  **You, all of you…**

“I will not bend my head to anyone who thinks to control me when they cannot even control themselves! A class representative, no, a _leader_ has to make people want to follow them, to judge themselves and be willing to be judged. A leader has to touch a heart before they ask for a hand, not follow a path but make the trail that others might follow, and accept that whatever credit earned belongs to the people first and them last if ever at all.”  **WILL KNE—!**

_E̛͞n̶o͏͜ų͘g͡h̴̴.͜͠͝_

Itsuki took a deep breath and let it slowly between tightly clenched fangs. He shook his head, hands unclenching from their tightened grasp. Itsuki looked up once more at his peers and spoke softly, “Our class is young and while we may know the strength of our bodies, we know next to nothing of the strength of our character. I propose that each of us step up and announce ourselves and our intentions as representative and put it to a vote when the last word has been spoken.”

“Sounds good to me, make sure you finish before home room ends and wake me up when you all have decided,” stated Aizawa, already zipped up in his sleeping bag and lying down on the floor behind his desk.

Itsuki felt a sweat-drop course down the back of his head at the sight. _Man wastes no time for a nap does he?_

* * *

  
The election speeches didn’t take long to go through given that a good majority of the students hadn’t given serious thought or consideration into the role of class representative and why they made the best choice. Such gems as, “If you elect me, we’ll do weight training every morning and a boot camp at the beach this summer!” or “Pick me and we’ll be the funniest, awesomest class around!” were some such examples. Of course, those were the ones who were at least genuine in their reasoning while others…

“Because I’m the protagonist of this story damn it! I lead, you obey!”

“Dude,” huffed Sero in disbelief at Bakugo’s blunt announcement to the class. “Do you really believe in your own hype that much?”

“Duct-tape, I am the hype!”

In the end, the votes were tallied and by… a startling large number, the class representative and vice representative were chosen.

Itsuki stood at the head of the class, his face set in a neutral stare as he glanced down at his vice representative, Tiffany Zumwalt.

Honestly, Itsuki couldn’t say he was surprised. Both she and Yaoyorozu gave incredibly rousing speeches but the difference lay in the content. For all that she was a kind and frankly rather sweet girl, Yaoyorozu failed to realize the difference between what her lifestyle allotted compared to those of a lesser degree of financial wealth.

That and the class were likely impressed with how easily Zumwalt could cow two of the strongest students in the class with a mere smile.

_Impressed, terrified…_ **Same difference.**

“So then, the class rep is Marumaru, and the deputy class rep will be Zumwalt.” Aizawa popped up from behind his desk, still enwrapped within the folds of his sleeping bag.

Itsuki inclined his head to the class.

“I will do my best for all of you.” _I promise_. **Don’t make promises you can’t keep.**

* * *

  
Lunch-Rush was a chef, a connoisseur without equal even without the use of his Quirk. From the humble PB&J to the devilish dish Consommé, there was not a meal that the Cook Hero had not mastered and could prepare with ridiculous speed with the use of his Quirk. In the years following his retirement from the cooking circuit, Lunch-Rush had become accustomed to the repetition of his preparations. That wasn’t to say that he didn’t have the odd student that actually wanted to diverse from the atypical standards of a Japanese meal, just that those few were a welcome challenge to the mediocrity that his part-time job had become. To date, he had only been caught by surprise once.

Now, it seemed, he’d have to add another tally to that sheet.

“My ears have got to be more gummed up than the bleachers at a baseball stadium because I don’t, I say I don’t think I heard you correctly, boy. What, I say, what did you want for desert with your lunch?” Lunch-Rush clarified.

“A cockroach cluster.” Itsuki repeated dutifully, ignorant or outright ignoring the stares and queasy looks he was receiving from those standing behind him. “It’s from—”

“I know what it’s from, I have, I say, I have watched my fair share of television shows, but where do get the idea that I can make something fictional?” asked Lunch-Rush, completely missing the way Itsuki’s eye twitched slightly as though he had a popped a small blood vessel somewhere in his noggin.

Itsuki loosed a sigh more to calm his temper than in any actual disappointment. “Well, if you can’t I can ask for something else.”

Like a switch being thrown, or rather a certain trigger being pressed, Lunch-Rush’s Quirk activated and suddenly, inexplicably as always, he knew how to make… all of them. Every single dish, drink, and confectionary that he had ever read or seen that had always been considered as little more than a work of fiction whose means of reproduction, even with mundane methods, was nothing short of impossible. Not once in his long career had he ever been asked to try and thus not once did his Quirk have the chance to shine once more. Sure, people have asked him to try and make the impossible but never has anyone dared to try and ask him to create the fantastical.

True, they wouldn’t be magical in the literal sense of the word, but darned if they weren’t the next best things anyway! For the first time in years, Lunch-Rush was _inspired_ and what else could he do but laugh as a result?

“Gwafafafafa! Boy, I say boy, even without my Quirk I have mastered 5 trillion recipes! But you, I say you, have just opened up a whole new world of delectable possibilities.” He looked aside, “And here I thought the highlight of my career would be recreating that Mesopotamian pie or the 99-cheese pizza.” He turned back to Itsuki. “So, as my thanks, you are getting a baker’s dozen!”

“Ah, thank you very much.” _All according to plan…_ ** Such a simple thing… **

* * *

  
Aizawa didn’t know what was the more prominent source of his headache. That god-damned alarm system going off in the building loud enough to still be heard clearly outside, Hizashi “whispering” in his ear, or the horde of reporters that apparently did not comprehend the word trespassing.

The reporter at the front of the pack, a young woman that looked kind of crazy in the eyes, nearly jabbed him in the face with her microphone, as she fervently demanded, “All you have to do is give us All Might! He’s here isn’t he?!”

“It’s his day off…” answered Hizashi, fingers carefully crossed behind his back.

“If you just give us a brief comment, we’ll leave!” yelled out another reporter.

“Look, I know how this works we give you an inch you’ll demand a mile,” grumbled Aizawa.

The doors opened behind the two teachers and Itsuki stuck his head out. “Ah, there you are Aizawa-sensei.” He stepped outside. “Sorry to be bothering you during lunch but I had a few questions regarding the class officers?”

Aizawa turned to his student, though he did take note of how many of the reporters present seemed to suddenly turn pale and take several steps back from the boy. “This isn’t really the best time Marumaru.”

Standing where he was, Hizashi had a clear line of sight of what was currently being griped in Itsuki’s hand and he turned positively green at the sight. “A-Ah wh-wha-what’s that you got there?”

“Hmm? Oh these?” Itsuki held up the bag for everyone to see and the reporters soon matched, or outmatched, the same emerald shade on Hizashi’s face. “Chocolate covered-cockroach, or cockroach clusters as they’re properly named.” He held the bag out towards Hizashi. “Would you like one?”

“NO!” Everyone winced at Hizashi’s loud declaration, thankfully without the use of his Quirk, as he retreated back several large steps. “No, thank you!”

“Hmm, your loss.” Itsuki reached into the bag and pulled out a cockroach and bit down on the thing’s head.

Though not present for the first time it occurred, Aizawa had a front row seat to what was to be the biggest mess the janitorial droids had to clean given that Hizashi had also joined in on the spree though he, at least, had the good grace of trying to aim for a nearby bush rather than the ground at Aizawa’s feet.

_I should have stayed in bed this morning…_

* * *

  
Itsuki stood at the front of the classroom with Tiffany by his side. Though brief, the two of them had managed to find time between classes to discuss the best candidates for the remaining officer positions left open in their class. They had come to a quick agreement on every single one, neither needing to justify their choice to the other. Itsuki strongly suspected there was more to Tiffany’s choices than she let on but given that they were the same as his own, he didn’t care to question them.

Itsuki cleared his throat. “Zumwalt and I have spoken at length over the positions of class officers and having heard of what transpired in the halls during that debacle with the press and the intruder alarm, I believe it goes without saying that Tenya Iida has rightfully earned a position as sergeant-at-arms of our classroom.”

Not for the first time, Itsuki wished he had a cell phone if only so that he had a means of capturing the image of Tenya looking like he had been smacked upside the head with a fish.

“Heck yeah he has!” cheered Ochaco, punching the air above her head with both hands.

“Emergency Exit Iida for sergeant!” decreed Mina with equal cheer.

“… If the class rep has nominated me… then it cannot be helped…” Tenya rose to his seat and held up his arm in a formal salute to the class. “From this day forth, I, Tenya Iida, promise to carry out the duties required of me as sergeant-at-arms!

Kirishima flashed him a thumbs-up, “We’re counting on you, Emergency Exit!”

“For our treasurer,” Tiffany spoke up lest the class get to invested in cheering Tenya’s oddly fitting nickname, “we have decided on Ochaco Uraraka.”

Itsuki once more silently cursed his lack of attaining photographic evidence as Ochaco’s eyes nearly bugged out of her head in surprise. “Wha-?!”

“Yes, she’d probably be the best at it.” Shoji nodded.

“You go, girlfriend!” Mina exclaimed gleefully.

“But-I’m—” Ochaco looked hastily about the room, and seeing a particularly curly-haired boy’s beaming smile aimed in her direction suddenly found her resolve. She shot to her feet, fists clenched tightly. “I’ll do it! I may not be the penny pincher you asked for but I’m the penny pincher you all need!”

Mina nodded her head eagerly. “Yeah that’s—! Wait, what?”

“For our choice in secretary, we decided on Mafune Katsura,” Itsuki spoke up before that can of worms could be opened fully, “and for historian, Izuku Midoriya.”

Katsura accepted her new role with a solitary nod while Izuku did what he did best, bounced back and forth between ashen white and beet red whilst stuttering. “Wh-Wh-What? M-me?”

Tiffany smiled and Izuku’s face settled on ashen. “Three words, Midori-chan. Ultra. Analysis. Books.”

Izuku’s gaping mouth shut with a snap.

Itsuki nodded sagely. _All according to plan…_ **Plan? What plan? There is no plan for this… We don’t even know what THIS is!**

Beside him, Tiffany also nodded, unknowingly thinking the same thing as Itsuki. _Operation: Get Midori-chan a Girlfriend and new Bro-Friends is a go!_

* * *

  
Nezu stood at the remains of the front gate with Midnight and No. 13 on either side of him and Recovery Girl, whom he most certainly was NOT speaking to today thank you very much, standing behind him. The four of them looked down at the remains of the door, trying to puzzle out just what had happened to it. For all intents and purposes, it looked as though the iron shield that had been intended to keep intruders had been rusted to the point of near oblivion.

Nezu carefully looked over the remains of the gate, taking note that whatever it was that had caused this effect had likely spread outwards in some way given that most of the outer-edge of the metallic shield was still standing. The remains were most, and quite literally, dusty piles of rust with few pieces bigger than Nezu’s paws remaining.

“How were ordinary members of the press able to do something like this?” asked No. 13.

“And bypass our security? The secondary and tertiary shields failed to launch.” Midnight said, frowning thoughtfully.

“This was not done by some reporter hoping for the next hot story on All Might,” said Nezu. “This had to have been done by a villain though for what purpose? To slip into our school in search of something perhaps, but then what could be so important they’d do such a thing in the open like this? Nothing of important has been taken and no files accessed before, during, or after the alarms went off. Is this to be taken as a declaration of war, to show us how weak our defenses are and how easily they can be overcome?”

He sighed, looking down at his shoes for a moment.

“At least the janitorial droids have something else to clean up besides vomit this time…”

* * *

  
“I see you’ve completed your errand.”

“Go die, Kurogiri.”

Not for the first time, Kurogiri wondered just when it became his job to play babysitter to Sensei’s supposed successor. For a time, Kurogiri had thought it was because he was a patient man and patience was needed in excess with this one. Then he had the misfortune to see firsthand what their Quirk could do. Only then did Kurogiri realize the truth.

The successor was, in no unquestionable terms, a child with a loaded gun and would readily fire it at any opportunity. Kurogiri was to not only make sure that this did not happen needlessly but to readily transport any potential victim, living or otherwise, far and away from the successor’s wrath. Hell, during one particularly nasty episode he had been given direct permission from Sensei himself to transport his successor to the heart of Antarctica just long enough for them to cool off.

_… Pun not intended._

Since then, Sensei’s successor did not care for him. Hell, Kurogiri was fairly certain that they hated him for the fact that he could, and had, readily defended himself and others from succumbing to their Quirk. Still… there was respect if only because he had been brought forth by their Sensei and how much the man clearly favored him above most others in their small organization. In the time since then their relationship, which in itself was a stretch of that very word, was one of barest of acknowledgements on either side unless Sensei bade for them to collaborate together.

“These are the new batch of hopefuls at U.A. huh…” A sneer even if was a hidden one beneath that godforsaken mask. “I’m not impressed.”

Kurogiri stood behind them, looking over the files and photos that had been delivered to his bar. Whomever it was that Sensei had lurking about in that school’s halls had been surprisingly thorough. The files not only had the individual names of every student in Class 1-A, they included a brief summarization of their Quirks.

Sensei’s successor continued flipping through them, tossing them aside after barely a glance until they suddenly, inexplicably stopped. Their shoulders hunched forward, their body trembling in a way that Kurogiri knew could only spell disaster and subconsciously readied his Quirk. There was a noise from Sensei’s successor, one that Kurogiri had never once heard before. It was a choking, almost wheezing sound.

_Oh dear God in Heaven is that supposed to be… laughter…?_

“Oh Sensei…” The successor whispered almost rapturously. “You really do love me, don’t you?”

Kurogiri tried very much to not think of how such words spoken in such a tone by such a person could be interpreted and failed miserably. _Seriously, this child…_

“Kurogiri!”

“Yes?”

“Gather the fodder and… one of the Nomu. You know the one.”

He did and that both confused and worried him. “That one? But it was created specifically for—”

They rose to their feet, shrieking, “Do you take me for a fool?! I was the one who demanded its creation from Sensei!”

Kurogiri did not visibly cower though he was further unnerved. He… had not known that detail…

“If that is so then why?” He thought to speak that person’s name but then thought better of it. He had only just gotten the last of the repairs to his bar completed a few days back. “You can’t kill him if he isn’t going to be there.”

“I cannot.” They agreed but held up a lone picture. “But I can kill his successor!”

* * *

  
All Might was a man who had faced evil head on more times than he could count. In point of fact, if he were to start recounting every villain he had ever faced, from the humble mook to the dastardly evil villain… Oh geez, he’d not finish before the New Year if even that early! Really, there were just that many mooks and after a time they all just started to blend together and there he was distracting himself again.

He had already saved quite a few people on his way to his appointment this morning and while he wasn’t running late per-say, he was certainly cutting far too close. By the time he had arrived at Midoriya’s home, he had but minutes to spare and spare them he did staring dumbfounded up at the humble apartment complex.

“They must have an entire floor for themselves…” He mumbled to himself. “Yes, that has to be it…”

Carefully brushing off some imaginary dust from his suit, All Might made his way up to the designated apartment number. It wasn’t at the top floor, nor was it down near the bottom, and from what he saw of the nameplates decorating the various other apartment doors, was all owned by a single family.

His expectations were clearly not to be met this day.

Finding the door, All Might cleared his throat and knocked gently upon the door. It opened with nary a sound and he smiled, “Ah, hello there Mrs. Midori—”

A finger jabbed him directly in the scarred area of his torso and given how unexpected the blow was, both in its delivery and its strength, one could hardly blame All Might for reflexively reverting to his true form with a cough of blood and a sudden cloud of steam.

A handkerchief was handed to him and he accepted gladly, finishing his coughing fit even as his host gently apologized, “I’m sorry but really, what are you thinking just showing up here like that? Do you really want to waste what little time you have in that form just to be taking tea with me, Yagi-san?”

“A-Ahh… you… how…?” Toshinori loosed once last cough and looked at Inko Midoriya. She was a petite figure, thin and lithe, and her emerald hair, a touch brighter than that of her son’s, was done in a style that brought forth a familiar pang of regret and nostalgia in his heart. If anyone had told him this was a woman just entering her forties, Toshinori would gladly have called bullshit and demanded some form of proof because she didn’t look a day over twenty-five if even that. The only true sign of her age was the faint streaks of white that permeated two locks of hair that fell past her luminously bright aquamarine eyes.

She smiled in a way only a mother could when addressing a ridiculously silly question, “My son suddenly begins an exercise and dietary regime and you honestly didn’t think that I would want to know why? That I wouldn’t simply follow him to that trash-ridden beach and see the two of you?”

Toshinori was strongly starting to suspect that he was starting to suspect his old teacher’s senility was contagious if he was being caught with his metaphorical pants down so easily. _Then again, considering just whom it is I’m talking to, I should take some solace that I had been found out by one of the best—_

“Now, come, sit. I have some tea prepared and some foodstuffs that I know a man in your condition can eat. I expect to find naught but crumbs at the end of our conversation, Yagi-san, or I will be… disappointed.” She frowned slightly at the mere thought and Toshinori hastily nodded and followed behind her to a modest dining room table, adjacent to a small kitchen in an otherwise homely but still quite small apartment.

Toshinori paused and looked at the door next to him, one that was clearly labeled as young Midoriya’s with a nameplate stylized after his Silver Age costume and signature hairstyle. He was curious to see what lay within but even he was not so foolish as to open that Pandora’s box. Not to say he wouldn’t tease young Midoriya about the possible contents at a later time mind you, the lad was quite the fan-boy, of that All Might had _absolutely_ no doubt, but he was a fan-boy who was both easily riled up and embarrassed.

Really, that boy was so… darn, what do kids these days call it…? Adorkable? He’d need to consult one of his teaching guidebooks later. He had marked the section concerning teenage slang hadn’t he?

Toshinori took a seat across from Mrs. Midoriya, nodding in silent thanks as she poured him a cup of tea that steamed lightly in his cup. “So… does he know?”

“If you mean Izuku, no he doesn’t.” She watched him expectantly and he hesitantly took a sip of tea. “If you are referring to my husband, well, he wants to speak to you anyway so you can ask him when he calls.”

Toshinori’s eyes bugged out and he hastily swallowed his tea lest he spit it back out. He swallowed again, wondering just how he could feel his stomach tying itself into knots if he didn’t have a stomach in the first place. “He… can do that…? I… was under the impression he…”

“Can’t? Won’t?” She smiled and shook her head. “Much as the government might pretend to otherwise, when he left Japan he left it on his terms.”

“Yes… Yes, I suppose he did, didn’t he…?” He said, recalling well that day that seemed so long ago now…

“Until then, I’m sure you have a great many questions for me as I do for you.”

Toshinori felt a nervous bead of sweat trail down his brow at that. “Ah, yes, I suppose I could start?”

“Yes, you can start.” She leaned forward, hiding her mouth behind clasped hands as she regarded him. “So pray, tell me, what made you think trying to make my baby boy into a liar was a good idea?”

Several more beads joined the first as Toshinori took an intense interest in his tea, silently and quite fervently, praying for someone, anyone, to rescue him from this conversation. Heck, he’d take the devil himself!

* * *

  
Itsuki sneezed, scratching at his nose in slight irritation.

“Bless you,” chirped Tiffany from behind him. He turned and nodded in thanks, overlooking their class once more. Today was to be the first day of rescue training and while Aizawa had allowed them the option of wearing their full hero uniforms, many of them had opted out of certain features. Mostly masks or helmets though there were some which frankly confused Itsuki. He didn’t see the point of Bakugo forgoing one of his two gauntlets nor was there was a lot of sense in Kurokage forgoing his regal cape.

True, it was barely the end of their first week and only the second time wearing even pieces of their heroic uniforms but Itsuki would think anyone truly dedicated to becoming a hero would choose to wear their full regalia.

He blinked. _The heck… Why did I think of that word specifically?_

“Kaichou! Fukukaichou!” With a glimmer of light reflecting off his glasses and armor alike, Tenya appeared before the two with a salute. “Shall I gather our class in accordance to my bus boarding plan?”

Itsuki repressed a sigh while Tiffany smiled, “Have at it, Iida-kun.”

“As you command!” A blur that was more of Tenya’s natural speed rather than that of his Quirk, and he was standing beside the open door of the bus, whistle in his mouth blowing shrilly much to Itsuki’s displeasure. “Class 1-A, gather round! Form two lines in accordance to your student numbers to make boarding the bus go as smoothly as possible!”

Itsuki watched Tenya go at it, wondering not for the first time if this was what those in charge often felt when having to deal with an overzealous underling. He glanced down at his vice-president. “He has no idea that’s the wrong kind of bus for his plan.”

“Let him have his fun.” Tiffany smiled. “I can’t help but admire his enthusiasm.”

It didn’t take long for Tenya to realize that his carefully constructed plan that he had spent far longer on than strictly necessary was all for moot. He took it as well as to be expected, which in itself meant that he only apologized to Itsuki and Tiffany profusely two times each before sulking in his seat at his failure.

Itsuki sat back in his seat with a small smirk. _I should try and curb his eccentricities but… I am enjoying this far too much._

“I didn’t think it’d be this kind of bus,” groaned Tenya, head bowed in shame.

“There was no point at all huh?” asked Mina with a cheery smile.

“If we’re pointing out the obvious then there’s something I want to say,” said Tsuyu turning not towards Izuku as Itsuki had expected but towards him, “about you Marumaru-chan.”

“Yes, Asui?”

“Call me Tsu-chan.”

“Only if I can be called Itsu-kun.”

“Deal, kero.”

_How does he do that so easily?!_ Izuku mentally boggled, doing his best not to turn and face the girl sitting next to him lest his face match Kirishima’s hair. _Calling someone by their first name and ad-adding “chan” too!_

“Your Quirk is a lot like Ryukyu’s isn’t it?”

Itsuki blinked at that, his left hand unknowingly snapping tightly into a fist at his side.

_N҉o͢.͞_

“Wait a sec, Tsu-chan,” interjected Kirishima, leaning forward in his seat across from Fumiko, Izuku, Tsuyu, and Itsuki.

_Oh come on!_ Izuku mentally cried, almost turning to look away and weep but recalling that way led to the path of further embarrassment. _It can’t be that easy can it?!_

“There are a lot of transformation type Quirks out there that resemble each other. At least yours lets you do a lot of flashy stuff!” Kirishima smiled as he held up his arm and with nary a twitch, his flesh became as tough as stone. “My Hardening is strong but far from impressive.”

Though silent to everyone else, the little bell of opportunity rung loud and clear in Izuku’s head.

“Oh no way, I think it’s really awesome looking! It’s definitely pro material!” he gushed excitedly.

Kirishima looked at his arm, as though he was actually seeing it for the first time. “Pro material, huh? I guess that might be true but you have to think about popularity as a hero too you know.”

“Which is why one must present one’s self as regally as possible, or so we have been told,” stated Kurokage, holding his crowned head high.

“You gotta drop that “we” thing, sweetie…” Mina stated with a sweat-droplet coursing down the back of her head.

“Though if we are talking about flashy and strong… It’s gotta be Bakugo and Todoroki, right?” Kirishima said.

“Bakugo’s always mad though, so he doesn’t seem like he’ll be that popular a hero.” Tsuyu stated.

“What the hell?! You wanna fight?!” exclaimed Bakugo, rising up from his seat with a sneer and clenching teeth.

“You see?” Tsuyu pointed with a small smile.

Tiffany giggled. “Wow, this has to be a record for you, Katsushit. Barely a week and already everyone here knows your personality is absolute garbage.”

Bakugo’s teeth clenched even tighter before he slammed himself back into his seat with a grunt and a few choice words that Jirou, who made the horrible mistake of sitting next to him, idly made note of for future use. If nothing else, the volatile blonde was an excellent source of new curse words and threats of bodily harm she was certain violated more than a few laws, actual and physical.

Izuku, hands clasped tightly to his head, tried to understand the topsy-turvy world he had inexplicably found himself in. _Guys calling girls by their first names, girls calling guys by their first names and now Kacchan is being teased?! What is this world that I am in right now?!_

“What a vulgar tongue,” murmured Yaoyorozu, hand placed delicately over her mouth.

Ochaco nodded with a beaming smile, “But it is kind of funny seeing him get so riled up.”

Aizawa looked back from his place at the forefront of the bus. “We’re here. Stop messing around.”

Itsuki looked back through the window towards the massive building that served as the Unforeseen Simulation Joint. He knew what was to come next and his left hand twitched into claws as golden scales sprouted up beneath his skin.

_This is it._ **Fool. This is merely the beginning. **

* * *

  
Itsuki made sure to stand as close to the stairs as he could when No. 13 spoke quietly with Aizawa for a brief, not truly listening in as he had his attention elsewhere. He was looking over the grounds of the USJ, as he stood with golden scales and draconic features prominent as ever before. He hadn’t swelled larger in size or allowed more of his body to be changed for such a thing would undoubtedly draw too much attention and too many questions. It was as That One had seen and what, undoubtedly, many of his classmates thought, a veritable theme park of disasters of all shapes and sizes.

He listened with half an ear as the Outer Space Hero began the course in earnest. “My Quirk is known as Black Hole. With it, I can suck up anything and turn it to dust.”

Ochaco’s head was a blur as she nodded excitedly, all but bouncing in place from the sheer excitement of being literal feet from her greatest source of inspiration of becoming a hero. “You’ve been able to use that Quirk to save people from all kinds of disasters!”

“That is true but it is a Quirk that can very easily be used to kill.” Itsuki turned his head fully to Thirteen, eyes narrowed and sharp as whatever good mood the class had died a swift and painless death. “Some of you also have Quirks like that, right? In our superhuman society, all Quirks are certified and stringently regulated so we often overlook how unsafe they can actually be. Please do not forget that there are many Quirks that can easily end a life with a single misstep even when used for the right reasons.

“With Aizawa’s physical fitness test, you now have a solid idea of the potential of your Quirks and thanks to All Might’s combat training, you likely experienced the dangers of using your power against people. Carry those lessons closely in this class. Today, you are going to learn how to use your Quirks to save people’s lives. You will not be using your powers to harm but to help. It is my hope that you will leave here with the understanding that you have such gifts, such potential, in order to truly understand what being a hero is all about. That is all I have to say. Thank you all for listening.”

Thirteen bowed low to the class in a manner more atypical to those of European descent but it mattered little to the class as they cheered and applauded the Space Hero’s words.

Itsuki’s eyes snapped to the lights of the USJ as they flickered and died in one fell swoop. He turned his head to stare down at the bottom of the stairs, hands unknowingly flexing into sharpened claws and spindly fingers.

_Here they come._

A strange, black distortion appeared in the air down at the bottom of the massive stairs just before the equally massive, and in hindsight questionably placed, water fountain in the center court of the USJ. At a glance, it could almost be mistaken for a sudden cloud of smoke or maybe even mist but no element of either sort could move in a way that was clearly and most assuredly alive with a mind with which to think. Slowly, figures emerged from the warping mist that served as a gateway between here and whatever hive of scum and villainy they crawled out from. For that was what they were, each and every one of them a thief, a conman, a murderer… but one word above all others defined them suitably.

Villains.

A veritable horde, their numbers bordering on an obscene crowd, they moved forward with purpose, teeth glinting, eyes gleaming, and Quirks at the ready. Each and every one of these villains had a reason for being here. Some of them wanted to injure, a few wanted to cripple, but a great many wanted to kill all one thing: Heroes. That those heroes present numbered a mere two with a classroom of potentials didn’t matter to them. Be they fully grown and fully capable adults or young and untested youths didn’t matter.

They would die all the same.

Itsuki stood tall, neck stretched as high as he could make it without transforming further than he already was. The villains were thugs, crooks, and murderers, but few wore anything of note or distinction. No terrifying gear to instill fear, no horrifying masks with which to announce their presence to the world, and not a one of them differing to a specific leader or figure amongst the horde.

_Because they haven’t arrived yet… Where are you…?_ ** Shigaraki… **

The warping cloud condensed suddenly into a loosely humanoid figure, standing tall and wavering behind the crowd with another villain standing at their side. Itsuki’s eyes narrowed, pupils thinning into reptilian slits as his eyesight reached inhuman heights. He nearly stumbled back in surprise.

_That’s…! That’s not—!_

Standing beside Kurogiri was not a disheveled youth, barely an adult in body and rarely so in mind. This person stood tall, not a hint of childish boredom or naïve posturing. It was a girl, some years older than Class 1-A at best, and her costume, if it could even be called as such, was that of an atypical high school sailor uniform though not one for any school that the heroes and students above recognized.

She wore a pair of armguards and kneepads that resembled the chitin hide of a crustacean colored in blackened hues of deep crimson. Her hair, dyed in the same shades as her armor, was tied tightly in a thick, messy braid that ended in a tie of barbed metal blades that hung down by her ankles while forelocks of bloodied red were brushed up from her amber eyes. Upon her face was a gasmask that was crudely redesigned to resemble an alien maw of spikes and fangs through which escaped tiny wisps of discolored gas with her every exhaled breath.

She stood in cool indifference beside Kurogiri, her arms crossed beneath her modestly sized chest. A pair of swords that only resembled katana in overall shape rested on her hips, loosely held in place with tattered ribbons splattered with blood and with no sheathe to reside in. The blades were both stained red with dried blood, their serrated edges shining wetly in the light of the USJ.

_Who the hell is that?!_ ** That’s not Shigaraki? **

She turned her head slightly to Kurogiri and with visible hesitation, the Warp-Gate maker rippled once more, his form stretching out far and away from her and the gathered villains. Itsuki’s hands tightened, clawed tips nearly renting through the toughed scales of his palms. The mist rippled as another moved through its dimensional barriers.

Itsuki’s blood froze solid in his veins at the sight of it.  **What is that?**

What had emerged from the portal was not the Nomu That One had seen. **WHAT. IS. THAT?**

It was something a thousand times more horrible than that.  **Impossible…!**

It was no beast of blackened flesh, massive musculature, or even the stereotypical exposed brain. No, it was something that was far worse than what that illustrated monstrosity had ever been and many of its malformed brethren could ever be. For though the creature that trailed out of the warp-gate was not the Nomu That One knew, it was still a monster that both Itsuki and That One recognized all too well. **What? How do you—?!**

_H͢e̴’ş h͝e̵r͡e͢ ͡t͡oo͜.̵_

The stench hit the crowd of villains first before it reached those heroes gathered near the USJ’s main entrance. It struck them all both near and far like a runaway freight train, so strong that even those students and villains alike without advanced senses found themselves reeling in revulsion of the stink of rotting filth and toxic pollutants that the creature exuded with its every warbling breath.

It moved in a tumble of raw sewage and viscous fluids, blackened ooze squelching and bubbling with the weight of its malignant mass though it still stood even taller than All Might himself. Its body swayed even when standing in place, as though the very nature of its own body’s structure was a foreign and unfamiliar concept. Droplets fell from its body, hitting the floor with a hiss of acidic smoke. Those lost remnants trembling like frightened mice before rolling on their own volition into the body from where they had broken free.

_No… This…!_ ** This is IMPOSSIBLE! **

Its bulbous head broiled briefly before a pair of eyelids opened in thin, vertical slits of red, a near mirror to Itsuki’s own distinct coloration. Its eyes were human in design and yet possessed a wildness that was more befitting of an animal just barely tethered to its leash. Its arms pulled free from its body, pseudopod-like fingers long and thickly dripping more miasmic muck as it raised its boneless limbs high and loosed a loud bubbling roar.

The students stepped back, hands going to mouths and noses save one who instead took a daring step forward, clawed hands clenching with sparks of lightning dancing like coiling serpents around his body. Twin tails lashed, their bladed tips whipping in a frenzy of fear as Itsuki stared down in horror at the thing that was the League of Villain’s “premiere” Nomu. Past recollections of That One never witnessed before blended seamlessly with present sight before the golden-scaled teenager.

This thing was no mere Nomu; it was a monster in every possible meaning of the word. Its body was its food and its food was its body. Anything that even remotely served as a pollutant, from the acrid smoke of a forest fire to the toxic wastes buried deep and forgotten beneath desecrated earth, it would consume and grow until the entire world was enveloped by its miasmic mass.

Unnoticed by everyone present, Itsuki’s mouth moved of its volition and a voice not his own whispered one solitary name.

“Ḫ̷̤͊͛ḙ̺̟̫̓͜d̸̬̺̖̮̬̙̦͗͛͒̃ͥ̚o͐ͩ͏̭͙͙̪̰̘̙ȑ̞̍̎ͬ͂̕a͜h̉ͦͪ̇͏̪̦̝ͅ…̯̑”


	7. EPISODE 6.0: Not Gonna Die

_This is how it feels when you're bent and broken…?  
This is how it feels when your dignity's stolen…?  
When everything you love is leaving…  
You hold on to what you believe in. _

“Those are villains…? No way, how’d they break into a hero school like Yuuei?” Kirishima shook his head at the very notion.  
  
Yaoyorozu stepped forward, “Sensei what about the alarms? Why aren’t they going off?”  
  
“Did they only appear here or around the entire campus?” murmured Todoroki. “Either way, if the sensors aren’t responding, that means they must have someone with a Quirk that is masking their presence here. An isolated area separated from the main campus during a time when a class is supposed to be here. They’re fools but they are not idiots. This was planned with some sort of goal in mind.”  
  
“Thirteen, get them out of here and try calling the school as soon as you can.” Aizawa ordered, snapping his goggles into place over his eyes.  
  
“What about you, sir? You can’t fight all of them on your own! With that many, even if you nullify their Quirks… your fighting style is not suited for this kind of confrontation!” Izuku said.  
  
“You can’t be a hero with just one trick.” Aizawa told him. He turned his head to his fellow teacher but didn’t move his gaze from the villains below, his Quirk alive and activated beneath his goggles as he actively sought out the one jamming communications to the outside. “I leave it to you, Thirteen.”  
  
And the hero Eraser Head leapt to the horde below and Itsuki finally snapped out of his stupor with a silent curse that would have even impressed the likes of Bakugo.  
  
“Itsu-kun, hurry up!” called Tiffany.  
  
“Now’s not the time for analysis, Midoriya-kun!” shouted Tenya.  
  
Itsuki ignored them both as gaze remained on the Nomu and he breathed a silent sigh of relief that it remained where it was far and away from the horde as Eraser Head slowly but steadily brought every villain in his path down. He looked to the back where the girl stood alone without—  
  
 _Kurogiri!_  
  
Itsuki whirled as a blackened warp gate appeared between his retreating classmates and the door, erupting upwards into a massive form of darkness.  
  
“There is no escape for you.” Kurogiri intoned gravely, “It’s a pleasure to meet you. We are the League of Villains. It may be presumptuous of us, but we have invited ourselves in to this haven of justice, U.A. High School.”  
  
Itsuki’s eyes twitched, both of his hands clenching tightly. _He’s… actually monologuing…_ **Pretentious fool!**  
  
“I believe there was some miscommunication. We were under the impression that All Might would be here as well. Pity. There would be no better place for the Symbol of Peace to draw his last breath.” Kurogiri sighed before his form spread itself wide in a dark mockery of a welcoming embrace. “Ah well, in the end, I suppose it doesn’t matter. After all, we can still kill—”  
  
Lightning blasted over the heads of the students and impacting the one and only physical part of Kurogiri that remained no matter the form he took, the metal brace around his neck.  
  
“AAAARRRGH!” Kurogiri writhed in agony as hundreds of volts of electricity coursed through him, shades of his body evaporating into the ether.  
  
Itsuki stepped forward, standing a towering fourteen feet tall with twin tails rattling angrily behind him. “Oh, that must have been quite the shock for you huh?”  
  
Kurogiri shook his head, golden eyes narrowing as they beheld Itsuki. “I see U.A. isn’t without it’s—”  
  
Another bolt of lightning actually blasted Kurogiri back and he did not scream so much as shriek as the voltage was three times that what he had been struck with before.  
  
“The problem with villains is that they think that that they are suppose to be allowed the chance to preach sinister sermons and to gloat of grand designs. Words are meaningless.” Lightning arced between Itsuki’s fangs. “Actions speak so much louder.”  
  
“Gh-! You—!” Another bolt of lightning and Kurogiri writhed as his screams pitched ever upwards into agonized shrieking as Itsuki continued to pump the voltage higher and higher.  
  
“Marumaru! Enough!” No. 13 shouted over the man’s pained wailing.  
  
Itsuki’s mouth snapped shut. He regarded for Kurogiri for a long moment, waiting to see if the man would try anything further.  
  
“Such a force, such numbers, they did not come here to gloat or to preach.” Itsuki hissed. “Those villains down there have come here for one thing: to kill each and every one of us. We cannot let such delusions continue any further. We will show them the error of their ways in the only language they understand.”  
  
He loosed another quiet hiss and turned back around, staring down at the Nomu, which continued to stare listlessly forward as it swayed to and fro.  
  
“But that one… If there is one amongst them capable of ending us and All Might together… It is that keter down there.” Itsuki’s whispered words held no meaning to those around him, many of whom had absolutely no idea what such a word like “keter” meant but for three. Of those three, only one amongst them truly understood the connotations of that word.  
  
“Where?” Thirteen stepped forward, looking down at the crowd. “Where is it?”  
  
“There.” Itsuki pointed at the pile of living sludge.  
  
“You’re certain?” Thirteen asked. “Because if you merely believe—”  
  
“There is no belief, only acknowledgement of the threat that creature poses to us.” Itsuki snarled low. “We will not allow another Tokyo to happen before our eyes. Not again.”  
  
“… It will not.” Thirteen shook their head. “Go with your classmates, Marumaru. I will aid Aizawa-senpai.” Itsuki growled low in his throat and opened his mouth to protest when Thirteen raised their hand up sharply. “If you know what a keter is… then you know EXACTLY what I will have to do to stop it.”  
  
“… Yes.” Itsuki murmured.  
  
“Good. Go—”  
  
“TO HELL!” Darkness erupted from Kurogiri, the man roaring in rage as he reacted entirely on instinct not to flee for his life but to send the threats of it far and away from him to their assured doom. However, instinct combined with pain wrought from having one’s body nearly torn asunder via several thousands volts of electricity, did not a sensible mind make. The plan, such as it was, had been to take what students Kurogiri could grab and toss them to various parts of the U.S.J. where their Quirks would only inhibit them or against those whose own Quirks trumped their own.  
  
His mind awash with pain like he had never experienced with a level of terror he had felt only once before, Kurogiri did not care to follow any such plan. All that mattered to him was getting the monster away from him as far as possible.  
  


* * *

  
Itsuki landed with a crash, the road beneath him shattering in a small crater. He had landed on his feet, talons digging deep and clawed fingers deeper but the jarring transition from there to here had done little for his control. His body had swollen upwards, pushing close to thirty feet in all with twin tails twining ferociously behind him. He stared blankly forward, ignorant of the artificial storm going on above him and loosing whole sheets of rain upon his golden scales.  
  
He rose to his feet slowly, reptilian slits overlooking the area that he had been transported to. Controlled bolts of lightning arced through the specially crafted rods and wires in a domed ceiling in a careful reconstruction of a thunderstorm. The rain above drowned the streets below with a flood of torrential rain that seemed to only grow all the more fierce with every passing moment as once artificial winds began to howl.  
  
This was the Downpour Zone.  
  
Itsuki lowered his head, nose nearly touching the water-laden street, shoulders trembling. The villains that had once drawn near, faces jeering, teeth and steel glinting from the arcing flashes of lightning up above, stopped in their tracks. Large as he was, fearsome as he looked, these traits together or alone had not been enough to give those who would gladly be his murderer pause.  
  
It was a sound.  
  
A sound so familiar and yet almost alien to their ears, a noise that shook them down to their blackened souls and bade their merciless hearts to quiver in their cages of bones and sinew.  
  
“Bididididididiii…”  
  
Laughter.  
  
Their prey, the young would-be-hero, was laughing.  
  
A serpentine neck straightened and rose up a draconic head bedecked in a crown of horns. Fangs were brought alight with coils of lightning whilst serpent’s tongue danced madly between widely gaping jaws.  
  
“BIIIIDIDIDIDIDIDIDIDIIII!!!”  
  
Correction.  
  
He was cackling.  
  
Quick as it had begun, the sound ceased, the jaws clamping tight, the twining tails steadily weaving as they sounded their rattling song of pain and misery. Itsuki’s eyes opened and those hardened criminals, the blooded and the blackened, knew that what stood before them was neither a child nor a hero.  
  
It was a demon.  
  
Only one of them was clever, only one of them thought to do the intelligent thing. She turned tail and ran for the nearest exit, heedless of the eyes that spotted her, the jaws that opened wide behind her, and the lightning that followed in her wake like a striking snake. A storm once tamed by mankind’s machinations of nature had now been set loose with all its unbridled fury, rain falling in thickening sheets and bolts of thunder coursing and winding like starving serpents above waiting for their chance to strike.  
  
She, at least, died in an instant, the bolt of electricity turning her to ashes lost amidst the watered winds of a storm turned real. She died afraid but firm in the belief that she, more than her wicked compatriots, could escape the demon’s wrathful storm.  
  
Those that were left were not granted such mercies.  
  


* * *

  
The darkness receded and faster than the human eye could naturally perceive, Katsura Mafune took stock of the immediate situation. Her altimeter indicated that she was approximately seventy-four feet above sea level. Twenty-three feet above and to the right was Ochaco Uraraka whilst Kyoka Jiro was a few more meters to the left. While there was a decent probability of survival from both of her peers, particularly if they were to utilize either of their Quirks, but the probability towards extreme if not outright debilitating injury was greater.  
  
A trio of ports opened up along her lower legs, an ethereal light shining from within before they ignited brightly in a burst of azure-tinted energy. Katsura flew through the air like a rocket and by chance of being closest —and in a far greater state of panic— she took hold of Uraraka first, grasping her like a sack of potatoes over her shoulder. A slight shift to compensate for the sudden increase in weight and aerial dynamics, Katsura took off towards Jiro and grabbed her around the waist in an underarm carry.  
  
Warning lights flashing in front of her eyes, and a silent wonder how one of the most petite looking girls in her class could contain so much mass, Katsura descended to the city street below and landed with just enough force to leave only a few dozen cracks in an already devastated street.  
  
Orientating herself into a fully upright position, but still holding tightly onto her two classmates, Katsura slowly scanned the area. The familiar sight of the domed ceiling high above assured her that they were still in the USJ. She frowned, which to anyone else would appear little more than a slight downward turn of the lips. Communications were still down to such a degree that even her advanced hardware was being inhibited by whatever Quirk was creating this essential dead-zone.  
  
“Ah-Ah Maf-Mafune-san you can let us down now,” stuttered Jiro, trying, and failing, to ignore how close Mafune’s hand was to her butt.  
  
“Please and thank you,” moaned Uraraka, trying to settle her stomach from the sudden flight.  
  
She blinked. “Affirmative.” She set them both down gently to the ground. “Are either of you in need of medical attention?”  
  
Uraraka shook her head, “Just a bit dizzy…”  
  
“I’m fine,” said Jiro, looking around the area. “Where are we?”  
  
“Evidence suggests that we are currently in the Earthquake Zone of the USJ,” stated Katsura.  
  
“Then that villain…?” asked Uraraka rising up to her feet.  
  
“A teleportation Quirk of some kind,” Jiro scowled. “An incredibly powerful one too if he was able to transport so many people into the USJ.”  
  
Katsura nodded and looked around once more. Her eyes narrowed and her tiny frown grew the tiniest bit more. “There is a group of individuals approaching fast from the northeast. Itsuki Marumaru’s deductions suggest they are a group of villains intending severe bodily harm. The both of you stay back whilst I deal with them. I am combat ready.”  
  
“What? Hey, don’t you just—!” Jiro started to protest when Katsura rocketed upwards, eyes still tracking the swiftly approaching group of villains. None of them appeared to have any ranged weapons but if there was one thing that had been instilled in her it was that there was no sense in not being pragmatic as possible. She took note of the devastated vehicles littering the street.  
  
Katsura didn’t smile. She hadn’t for a very long time now. Yet, the expression on her face could at the least be called a pleasant one as she descended at speed, hands clapping together. She landed between two cars, hands reaching out to touch them lightly with the tips of her fingers.  
  
She had to hand it to U.A. they took immersive experiences very seriously. Energy arced like lightning with her as the conductor of an orchestra of transmutation. Metals warped to her imagination, gears shifted and bent to her whim, and what resulted had the whole of the approaching horde skid to a halt in sheer dumbfounded disbelief.  
  
Katsura stood before them completely nonchalant as she held up what could best be described as a horrifically oversized rocket launcher if such a device were intended to emulate fantastical life. The open barrel of the cannon bore a frightening resemblance to the gaping jaws of a crocodilian whilst the rear bore the fanged grimace of a demon. Katsura hefted the massive apparatus up, revealing her arm lost amidst the machinery though not a single villain noticed.  
  
No, they were all too startled by the jaws of the cannon’s aft suddenly opening wide and the head jutting downward into the asphalt and crunching down. The now extended neck glowed molten red before the hellish head jerked back into place with an audible thump. Katsura lowered the launcher down until its maw aimed straight at the heart of the villains who only now started to suspect that running the opposite way was a far better idea.  
  
The recoil of the cannon’s blast caused Katsura to slide back, her feet digging a trail in the asphalt as a molten hot ball of freshly broiled tar launched forward. It did not travel far before the air caught it and caused it to spread outwards in a net of viscous, hot fluids.  
  
The villains all screamed and cursed and shouted, or so Katsura surmised, but not a one of them could break free, even the one that looked more like a creature of stone than of flesh and blood. As they struggled, Katsura gave them a slow scan, her eyes taking in what they could of their individual Quirks and what she found was worrying to say the least. Of those that she could identify at 90% accuracy, they were Quirks that were primarily Emitter-types and could admittedly have been quite the obstacle had they not been caught unawares.  
  
Some of her peers on the other hand…  
  
“Ka-Katsura-chan!” She blinked, turning just enough that she had one eye on the captured villains and the other watching as Uraraka and Jiro came running. While Jiro stumbled to a stop, a winded but no less concerned Uraraka raised her fists up. “Don’t just leave us behind like that!”  
  
“Ye-Yeah! We’re—huff!—heroes too damn it! Whew!” Jiro heaved, hands pressing hard on her knees as she tried to get her breath back. “Oh man, I need to take up track or something….”  
  
Katsura blinked, turning her head fully to face the villains. She replayed what her eyes had just seen within her mind, picture perfect memories playing like a video. There was no mistake. The reactions were small, positively grain-sized, but there had been recognition amongst the villains when they caught sight of Jiro.  
  
Katsura blinked again, dismissing the memory back into storage within her mind. She shook her head. “Apologies but of the three of us, I am the most combat ready.”  
  
“That’s—!” Uraraka started to protest before she deflated staring openly at the weapon Katsura held in her grasp. “Yeah, I can see that now…”  
  
“No kidding.” Jiro looked up at the rocket launcher that had seemingly been fused into Katsura’s left arm before her gaze traveled to the downed villains and frowned. “Is that… tar?”  
  
“Affirmative. Freshly heated at significant temperatures and fired at sufficient speeds it makes for a crude, if painful, capture net for those whose safety is secondary to those whose lives are at a more immediate risk.” Katsura looked to the maw of her weapon and frowned. Tar dribbled out between the open jaws of the launcher’s barrel like drool. “I am still perfecting its craftsmanship however.”  
  
A small clink and the weapon crashed to the ground and Katsura flexed her newly released hands.  
  
“A bit brutal don’t you think?” Jiro couldn’t help but frown in confusion. She had the best ears of anyone she knew, even her own mother, so why was it that she couldn’t hear the villains?  
  
“Negative. If what Itsuki Marumaru and Shoto Todoroki surmised is true, these villains fully intend to do at minimum extreme bodily harm if not outright murder. This group in particular seemed to have been put together with the intention of facing Fumikage Tokoyami, Koji Koda, and you, Kyoka Jiro.”  
  
Uraraka gasped while Jiro frowned, turning her full attention to the villains now, her earphone jacks stretching down towards her boots. “How the hell do you figure that?”  
  
“Simple.” Katsura pointed a finger at a villain, her hand spun tightly in place as a tranquilizer dart fired out from her fingertip and impacted the struggling zipper-mouthed woman’s neck with a hushed hiss of air. “That one possesses a Quirk that nullifies sound waves in close proximity to her person.”  
  
And with said villain now down into the sweet release of unconsciousness, those other villains whom were still awake and in quite a degree of pain could now voice their agonies freely and quite vocally.  
  
“That one…” FFT! “Possesses a Quirk that increases luminosity of objects, or persons, that generate light such as that individual there,” FFT! “As well as her,” FFT! “Though that one there I am unsure of,” FFT! “I can only surmise that he was drafted for the possibility of Koji Koda’s physical distinctiveness being more than merely cosmetic.”  
  
Katsura continued to silence them one-by-one as she fired dart after dart into them. The lucky ones got it in the neck, those few whose skin were evidently too hardy for simple needles got it straight in their open mouth.  
  
Uraraka did her best to ignore it and swallowed uncomfortably. “Um… Does that mean… what I think it means?”  
  
“These villains were forewarned of us and our capabilities.” Katsura stated. “It was no doubt thanks to Itsuki Marumaru that their plan has been unknowingly thrown into disarray.”  
  
“The prez?” Jiro asked, “How do you figure that?”  
  
“As I stated, one of these villains may have been placed here to counter you, Kyoka Jiro, but they were not prepared for either myself or Ochaco Uraraka, which means—”  
  
“They only know about the ones they were supposed to target!” exclaimed Uraraka.  
  
“Affirmative.” Katsura nodded. “Thanks to his immediate assault upon the villain meant to transport us throughout the Unforeseen Simulation Joint, there is a high probability that any others who were similarly transported to other locations are facing similarly unprepared foes.”  
  


* * *

  
Toshinori Yagi was unprepared. He was so unprepared that he was fairly certain that somewhere up there that a certain someone was undoubtedly shaking her head in pity of him whilst also laughing herself to the point of tears. He had faced madmen with delusions of godhood obsessed with satisfying their desires no matter the costs it wrought unto them and any innocent soul in their path. He had overcome Quirks that could very well knock actual deities from their perches of immortality and straight into the annals of obscurity. He had attained schooling on two separate continents from two entirely distinct, and frankly absolutely mad, forms of heroic education by men and women that had all but literally hammered into his very soul the words plus and ultra.  
  
None of that could ever compare to the petite figure sitting across from him taking a dainty sip of her tea.  
  
She had not uttered a single word throughout his explanations and his reasoning for having her son… lie. He had tried to word it slightly differently, really he had, but any mutterance to the actual truth, to try and insinuate that young Midoriya had merely “stretched the truth” resulted in a solitary raised eyebrow and a Look.  
  
Toshinori was not the most intelligent of men, but he was certainly not as much a fool as some people thought him to be. It only took two raises of that eyebrow and that Look leveled upon him for him to get the hint.  
  
Mrs. Midoriya finished her sip of tea and set the cup down gently. “I see. Thank you for explaining your choices. I’ll be sure to take them into consideration when I eventually speak to Izuku about the choices he has made and their consequences.”  
  
Toshinori didn’t even so much as twitch though inwardly he offered the boy all of his hopes and apologies.  
  
“Now then,” she clasped her hands together in front of her. “I’m sure you have questions of your own to ask.”  
  
“I… do…” He hesitated, looking questioningly towards the phone sitting opposite to her cup of tea, still and silent as it had been when he arrived.  
  
“My husband is many things, Yagi-san,” She said with a sigh, “Punctual is unfortunately not one of them.”  
  
“Then… if you don’t mind my asking…?” She gestured for him to continue and with a swallow of tea, alongside some nerves.  
  


* * *

  
“What the fuck?”  
  
Momo Yaoyorozu worriedly glanced towards Mina Ashido, understandably shocked at such foul words uttered from an otherwise clean-mouthed classmate. That such a thing had been said with something that Momo was nervously starting to realize was the beginnings of a smile only served to worry her further. The heiress of the Yaoyorozu family turned her attention back towards Fumiko Sato and the villains that she had placed herself in front of.  
  
Like Ashido, Momo had taken a generous step back at the villains’ approach not for fear of harm or at their alarming numbers but for the words they uttered. Crude, vile, and utterly disgusting were the nicest words Momo knew to describe what had spewed from their wretched mouths as they leered with staring eyes. Freshly dropped atop what could only be the mountainous zone of the USJ, the three girls had swiftly found themselves cornered between a rock and a hard place.  
  
On one side, a gaping divide somewhere about several stories steep down to flat and unforgiving stone ground and at the other, a sheer cliff face of smooth stone of greater heights. The villains, all of them male, had made no secret of where their disgusting gazes were drawn towards and what they had every intention of doing. They had approached slowly, their hulking and animalistic forms stalking forward towards their prey and both Momo and Ashido had their nerves fail them…  
  
Fumiko though, had not done as Momo or Ashido had done. No, she had taken a step forward and had informed the villains rather primly what she, in turn, would be doing to them. Were life like one of those car-tunes that Momo had heard so much about, she suspected that the record player would have come to a scratching halt.  
  
The villains’ words were cruel, sick, and absolutely evil in every possible meaning of the words.  
  
Fumiko’s words though… Well, Momo had not yet had the chance to read them in full but she was fairly certain that a few laws set by the Geneva Convention were being spit upon with gusto.  
  
The horde of villains had stopped dead in their tracks, many of their number looking either confused or unnerved. The leader of the pack, a man who looked like the long lost love child between a wolf and an octopus, tilted his tentacle-ridden face and unknowingly repeated Ashido’s whispered words, “What the fuck?”  
  
“I said that I’ll eviscerate you and use your gastrointestinal tract as a rubber glove in order to fornicate with your skull via my phalanges before you take one step more.” Fumiko repeated, with a bored expression more befitting of one talking about droller, and less physically violent, subjects.  
  
“… What—?”  
  
Faster than Momo could blink, Fumiko was suddenly standing where the leader of the villainous band once stood and the man himself now sailing high into the air via an uppercut straight into his—  
  
“OMG she punched him in the dick!” Ashido exclaimed sounding far too delighted to Momo’s ears.  
  
What followed was both a thing of beauty and of horror for while Fumiko demonstrated clearly that her degree of skill in the martial arts was nothing to scoff at, she demonstrated a tendency to aim—  
  
“Right in the dick! She keeps hitting them in the dick!” Ashido cackled as she clapped her hands delightedly.  
  
 _Why?! Why does she keep hitting them in the—_ Momo’s face flushed red as she mentally censored herself, _THERE?!_  
  
After the last of the villains were down, or so Momo hoped because some of those hits sounded like more than just bone had been broken, Fumiko’s shoulders relaxed and she whirled an arm tiredly. “Ah, knew I should have taken a gram of sugar first.”  
  
Mina’s eyes could almost be mistaken for the night sky in that moment for how many stars were shining in them. “You took them all down without your Quirk?!”  
  
“Seriously…?” murmured Momo in stunned disbelief.  
  
Fumiko turned towards the two with a raised eyebrow. “You both realize that when I use my Quirk my strength rises to such degree that I can, quite easily, shatter stone? Do either you have any idea what that degree of physical power can do to a human body let alone a pair of testicles?”  
  
“… Chunky salsa?”  
  
Momo slowly turned to look at Ashido, completely and utterly at a loss for words.  
  
“To put it lightly. Now, come on.” Fumiko fiddled with the rings on her wrist and pulled out a small bundle of zip ties. “We should make sure these louts are secured before we try and make our way back to the others.”  
  
“You have zip ties in your jewelry?” asked Ashido, following after the redhead.  
  
“Of course,” answered Fumiko, looking back at Momo for a second before continuing on with the task at hand. “I prefer to take action rather than wait for someone else to do it for me.”  
  
Momo flinched and hastily followed after her classmates, generating her own collection of zip ties.  
  


* * *

  
It waited.  
  
It had been brought.  
  
But it hadn’t been told what to do.  
  
So it waited.  
  
Watched.  
  
Waiting.  
  
It did not want for more.  
  
Could not want for more.  
  
Should not.  
  
Yet…  
  
It swayed.  
  
It wavered.  
  
It was waiting.  
  
Waiting for the Command.  
  
Waiting for the Order.  
  
Watching as the Hero fought his way through the horde. Watching as the horde’s numbers dwindled slowly and surely as the Hero similarly waned in strength and fortitude. Watching as The Successor of The One at last took to the field herself.  
  
It didn’t care though.  
  
Couldn’t care.  
  
Should not be able to care.  
  
Yet…  
  
It listened closely.  
  
It watched intently.  
  
The Successor of the One spoke to the Hero as she cut her way forward, blood and discolored gases following in her wake as she carved her path to meet them in the midst of the minions. She spoke words that it knew and recognized as merely that. She did not Order the Hero’s demise. Did not Command for his death.  
  
So it waited.  
  
So it turned its gaze elsewhere and saw—  
  
 ** _You._**  
  
It froze.  
  
It had no heart.  
  
It had no memory.  
  
It was.  
  
That was all.  
  
So how?  
  
How did it remember?  
  
How does it feel?  
  
 ** _YOU!_**  
  
It does not matter.  
  
It should not matter.  
  
It was.  
  
That was all.  
  
But it did matter.  
  
It mattered a lot.  
  
Because of **_you_** … It exists.  
  
So without Order or Command it moved.


	8. EPISODE 7.0: Back From The Dead

_Cold and black inside this coffin ‘cause you all try to keep me down…  
How it feels to be forgotten but you'll never forget me now… _

  
Kurogiri winced, body twitching this way and that as he tried and failed to coalesce into his human form. Lighnning-like energies crackled along his body in quick bursts, little serpents biting and vanishing in a sparkling flash of light. He cursed once more as he staggered himself upright. He glared at those remaining students who continued to impede him.  
  
Hanta Sero. Fumikage Tokoyami. Eijiro Kirishima.  
  
The report had noted all three of them to be at the bottom tier of Class 1-A. Still a threat as hero-in-training would be, but one that even the weakest and most pathetic of the fodder could overcome and kill.  
  
If this was the bottom, Kurogiri wondered what the hell those at the top were capable of.  
  
The three of them, displaying a level of teamwork and cooperation that frankly astounded the older man, had kept him on the backfoot long enough for Tenya Iida to make a hasty exist and swift race towards salvation. The boy was swift, a proud heir to the lineage of Iida, and Kurogiri knew that the plan, what little of it that could be called as such at this point, was rapidly falling apart and Kurogiri had no one to blame but himself for it. Sensei had made him to watch over his chosen heir, his precious—  
  
 _Bade… He bade me…_ **No, he made me.**  
  
Kurogiri shook his head, faint trails of electrical-like energy flickering through his amorphous mass once again. Whatever it was that Marumaru brat had struck him with, it did not act or feel like normal electricity. He would know. Kurogiri had been experimented on before.  
  
 _Tested. Sensei tested me._ **No… No he hadn’t…**  
  
“You ready to give up yet?” called Sero, arms akimbo at his side, ready to unleash another burst of cellophane-like tape to wind tightly around his weakness, the one portion of himself that remained even in Kurogiri’s most gaseous of forms.  
  
“Or shall we continue this mad banquet of darkness?” Tokoyami murmured quietly, his Dark Shadow hovering over him with clawed limbs outstretched as though to welcome Kurogiri into a painful embrace.  
  
“I’m ready to scrap some more if you are!” Kirishima’s grin was all fangs, his skin and hair harder than stone and thrice as jagged.  
  
 _Impudent brats!_ **So much… like…**  
  


* * *

  
Aizawa is a Hero. A Pro with exceptional skill and fortitude in the martial arts that even when going toe-to-toe with the likes of mountain breakers and steel-benders he took them to task and taught them the error of their hubris. For while his Quirk is exceptionally strong, his body is not a true example of superhuman in the strictest definition of the term. Yet, for all that he is a mortal man of flesh and blood, his body is as iron and his heart an unbreakable steel as he continued to lay low the countless villains in his path.  
  
What few licks he had been given he returned back in full: capture tape ensnaring, fists and feet colliding, burning eyes culling what Quirks it could to all who were in his gaze. He was a veteran hero, one whom had faced evil, seen the worst that humanity could do to itself, for years.  
  
What he saw now brought him up short.  
  
Making her way towards him without a single care to those who stood in her way was the ringleader of this incursion into U.A. The girl who couldn’t be any older than her mid-twenties if even that much, approached at a slow, almost lazy walk with her swords cutting a bloody trail on the ground behind her. How could they not when she was slashing away at her own underlings as though they were little more than a hindrance, some errant sapling stuck in her way?  
  
Her eyes were a sickly yellow and she stared openly into his own as she cut a bloody swath towards him, discolored gas erupting through the fangs of her gasmask with her every exhale. The villains who had now become aware of her approach hastily backed off and those that didn’t fell where they stood, dead before their bodies hit the ground before their heads landed upon the bloodied earth.  
  
Aizawa turned slowly and faced her fully, instinct and common sense telling him that even as he stood encircled, not a single attack would be made to his turned back from any of the other villains. Groups such as this, there was something of a pack mentality at work. Sure, they would bite and claw for whatever scraps they could sink their fangs into but the moment that the alpha approached, heads bowed low and claws sheathed.  
  
Black locks of hair wavered in an unfelt wind, Aizawa’s eyes gleaming behind his goggles as he watched the leader approach as the gas continued to flow from her gasmask.  
  
“It won’t work on me, Eraser Head.” Her voice came out surprisingly clear despite the mask she wore. There was a strange, electronic rasp to it, as though the mask itself was compensating for something that the girl’s actual voice lacked though what that was, Aizawa could only guess. “Such a pathetic Quirk will not stop me from killing him.”  
  
“So, you are here for someone in particular.” Aizawa noted idly, hands tensing and capture weapon tightening within his grasp, ready to be loosed at the tiniest twitch. “Anyone I happen to know?”  
  
She shook her head as though to clear it and loosed a sound that Aizawa supposed was laughter if such a sound could be associated with the word. “Oh, that’s the funniest thing. You have absolutely no idea. None of you do but in the end it won’t matter. That bastard’s legacy ends here and now.”  
  
No more words were spoken as swords flashed forward whilst yards of capture weapon coursed through the air.  
  


* * *

  
Like most of the other zones in the USJ, the Shipwreck Zone utilized specialized equipment and systems to best simulate the cataclysmic event it was meant to emulate. In this particular zone’s case, it was two separate ones, a ship stuck in the middle of a “sea” and a water slide meant to emulate a tidal wave with obstacles of stone and other assorted debris. The pool could emulate the ocean thanks to the wave bays, each equipped with a pair of panels operated by a fifteen-thousand horsepower hydraulic system and could create tidal waves in excess of several feet high just. A specialized plumbing system kept the water going from top to bottom and back again. When it was time for its monthly maintenance, at peak performance it’d take upwards of several hours for every last drop of water to be drained away.  
  
Via Black Hole, it took No. 13 mere minutes.  
  
The space-themed hero stood slowly, wobbling from the strain of overusing their Quirk to such disastrous measures. The two students whom had been clinging to their back now stood on their own feet, the larger of the two subtly pulling the other back away from No. 13. The blackened dome of No. 13’s helmet hid the grimace on their face at the look in the eyes of their students. Yet, such fear and trepidation in the eyes of No. 13’s two students could be forgiven.  
  
 _After all, they had just watched their teacher murder sixteen people._ Thirteen clenched their gloved hands tightly, feeling the hardened metal at the tips creaking slightly as their Quirk settled to stillness once more.  
  
Out loud, they said, “Forgive me for what you both have witnessed here today. It was never my intention for the two of you to see such a thing but current circumstances being what they are…”  
  
“Sensei… there… there was no other choice…” Though spoken as a statement, Koji Koda’s words sounded more like a question to Thirteen’s ears. The space-themed hero’s shoulders trembled before cold, emotionless steel replaced their heart once more as the knowledge of _why_ came to the fore once more.  
  
“There were several choices. Far too many to count. But the only choice that matters more than my own was that of these people here.” No. 13 turned around and Mezo Shoji stiffened as their helmeted gaze fell upon him, more notably the stump of a limb that was slowly bleeding still from when it had been bitten clean off. “After what they’ve done, not enough Tartarus would be open for them.”  
  
There must have been something in their voice, something in how they spoke the words, for Shoji to suddenly narrow his eyes, all five of them, at Thirteen. “Does this have to do with what Marumaru-kaichou was talking to you about? The—”  
  
“Do NOT say it.” Thirteen interrupted harshly, loud enough for their voice to crackle the sound system of their helmet causing the two boys to flinch back in surprise. Thirteen took a shuddering breath and let it out slowly. “Because if you say it… then I will have no choice but to tell you what it is. That is not an explanation that you want to hear. Either of you.”  
  
The two heroes-in-training exchanged a glance, one worried and trembling slightly, the other cool as the waters that still dripped from the locks of his hair. As one, they turned to their teacher.  
  
“Hai, sensei.”  
  
“Good. Now. Come with me. We need to get back up there fast…” _Before any more lives are lost needlessly…_  
  


* * *

  
There is a common criticism aimed towards heroes. That each and every one of them is damaged in a way that only several dedicated years of therapy could try and fix. After all, what kind of person dons a mask and cape in order to go out and beat up random people? Of course, those people tended to be the worst of society and true heroes were paid quite well in a multitude of ways. Those who shone like the stars they so desperately emulated could get all manner of sponsorships and from there a significant paycheck. Even the underground heroes who spurned the limelight earned a stipend that put them at the same level with military officers of significant ranks.  
  
Of course, that was only one piece of mentality, a small slice of the percentage pie that made up the why’s and how comes for most heroes.  
  
For those like Yui Kodai, it was never about the money or the fame.  
  
It was about trying to be a good person for all that her Quirk made her want to be anything but.  
  
Her Quirk, Size, allowed her to alter the size of any object that she last touched by varying magnitude based on how long she grasped her fingers together. Of course, that’s what her records said and all that she allowed anyone else to see. Her Quirk did in fact work on living beings, or rather, a singular being in particular.  
  
Herself.  
  
Uncle had told her that it was an element of her Quirk, that a change of mentality was at times necessary for a Quirk to work. A child who whose Quirk involved the ingestion of foreign materials that would otherwise harm, if not outright kill, anyone else would not be sullied by the taste and may in fact grow to develop a craving for such things as they grew older.  
  
It was normal, Uncle had said, for her to feel the way that she had felt as a child when she had used her Quirk.  
  
It didn’t change her mind. It couldn’t, it wouldn’t. She had made her choice, her _promise_ , and she would stick to it until the very end tempted though she might be to break it if it meant being free of Yōsei Kurokage’s unwarranted, and extremely unwanted, advances.  
  
In the insect-bodied teen’s defense, she had landed badly from the sudden teleport, and he was nothing if not chivalrous in his handling her like a princess freshly rescued from a castle. The fact that he kept calling her as such and absolutely refused to let her down from his bridal carry however neither endeared him to her nor helped her slowly fraying temper.  
  
Thankfully for Yōsei’s continued well-being, Shoto Todoroki mowing down the villains before the three of them in a single blast of arctic ice was enough to cool Yui’s anger.  
  
“A bit… over the top… would you say, Todoroki?” asked Yōsei, holding Yui closer to his armored chest, an action she subconsciously reciprocated with her arms tightening slightly around his neck as Todoroki’s scarred visage turned their way for the briefest of moments.  
  
“No.” Heated breath escaped in a cloud of steam before those steely orbs looked once more to the villains in front of the three students. A few of them had been in mid-motion when the ice-user had unleashed a frozen hell upon them, and the sudden stop had done them no favors. If by some miracle they survived being flash frozen as they had been, they would not find all of their bits and pieces attached. Their bodies numbed as they were by the sudden cold didn’t quell the pain any as many of them screamed themselves hoarse before silencing themselves with choked gasps of air when Todoroki took one single step forward.  
  
“Ice, on average, has a temperature of 32 degrees Fahrenheit. The human body can last up to five minutes in such a temperature before severe hypothermia sets in. You should already be feeling it right now. Irregular heartbeat, slower breathing rate. Pretty soon, you might just end up going into cardiac arrest.”  
  
“P-P-Please—”  
  
“Earlier, before that cloud-guy sent us here, my class president made a rather… distressing… observation. He said there is a Keter-Type Quirk here.”  
  
Yui flinched, the fingers of Yōsei’s hands suddenly clenching tight upon her but did not turn her gaze away from what was happening before the two of them.  
  
“I-I d-d-d-on’t know wh-wh-!”  
  
“A Keter-Type Quirk, in short, is what happened to Tokyo over a decade ago.”  
  
Yui’s eyes widened, her mouth dropping open in shock whilst Yōsei shivered, his body almost rippling as his grasp became like iron. There wasn’t a single citizen in all of Japan, and in fact most of the world at large, that didn’t know of what had occurred in Tokyo all those years ago. The reconstruction had only just been finished a handful of months ago and while some citizens jokingly referred to it as “Tokyo-II,” it was rarely, if ever, met with good humor.  
  
After all, over six million people had died.  
  
Todoroki continued, “That thing that you brought with you. What can it do? What is it capable of that someone would call it a Keter?”  
  
“I-I don’t kn-kn-know! Sh-Sh-She brought it! N-N-Never told us wha-wha-what it could d-d-d-do! Ex-Ex-Except…!”  
  
“Except what?”  
  
“Kill his successor!”  
  
Todoroki’s eyes narrowed. _That… is an interesting choice of words…_ “Whose successor?”  
  
“Todoroki, enough,” Yōsei interjected. “they’ll die if you leave them in that any longer.”  
  
For a moment, a mere microsecond really, Todoroki considered letting them. His father had told him of Keter-Types. What they were capable of. What would have to be done to stop them. Then, from one microsecond to the next, he realized that what he was doing was no different than what his father would do in his place.  
  
A blast of heated air shot forward. Not quite open flame, but for the excessive amount of warmth it may as well have been. The ice evaporated instantly into steam and the sudden shock of going from subzero to scalding hot sent every last villain into the sweet oblivion of unconsciousness.  
  
“Well, we suppose that’s one way of doing it.” Yōsei nodded. “Now, let us make haste. Kodai-hime should not have to suffer further.”  
  
“I’m going to squish you…” muttered Yui lowly under her breath.  
  
Yōsei tilted his head, somehow conveying the smile hidden beneath his helmet. “While we are open to new experiences, we best shelve that for later.”  
  
Kodai gave Yōsei a disbelieving stare, complete with her mouth hanging agape at the sheer audacity of his words, her face gaining a faint, rosy hue. The armored teenager wasn’t unaware of her stare and tilted his head as he chided lightly.  
  
“You need not try to catch any flies, Yui-hime, you’ve already caught us.”  
  
Really, what other response to that could Yui give?  
  
SMACK!  
  


* * *

  
It was quiet now. Nothing but the sound of fire burning and coloring the world in hues of bloodied red and furious orange. Half-cooked buildings stood as silent grave markers and their shadows wavered and danced to an unheard tune. In the distance, a flare of fire and noise artificially produced by mechanical devices and computerized timing rent the air like a dog’s bark. Another explosion sounded, naturally made and with the ferocity of a dragon denied its kill.  
  
The villain, a young man whose arms were bedecked in a series of quills longer than a butcher knife and gleaming just as sharply, held his shield upon against the monster’s wrath.  
  
It was a girl, young and unconscious. Alive though she did not immediately look it with one of the villain’s barbs piercing into her neck like an acupuncture needle. The villain had been far too lucky though he would not have thought so. First, he had gotten lost in the city, the shadows and the flames luring him away from the rest of his group. Then he had a one of the students —one that was part of his groups’ list of specific targets no less— fall literally into his arms. Via a quick application of his Quirk before she could get her wits about her, he gained a suitable hostage for any other hero that had the misfortune of being dropped into the wrong trap.  
  
The villain could not have known that while he may have caught hold of a frog, he had also caught the attention of a demon.  
  
That’s what the kid had to be. There could be no other explanation. No one could smile with teeth almost bared like deadly fangs, could laugh as though they were experiencing the time of their lives as they fought for their life!  
  
Now the demon-hero stood, gauntlet arms lowered at last, gloved fingers tensed as fire popped and crackled within his palms. The other villains lay scattered around, alive but severely injured. Blood pooling out of their ears, skin severely burnt, and more besides. The demon-hero had been merciful, allowing them the sweet embrace of unconsciousness so that their agonized screams no longer sung a mad cacophony of pain amidst the gentle songs of the open flames.  
  
The quilled villain had been lucky. The list of things capable of breaching through the near berserker-like haze that Katsuki Bakugo allowed himself to fall into was a small one. Its contents a mystery even to himself but when one such item was found, the haze evaporated like a morning mist before an unyielding sun.  
  
He had no time for the weak.  
  
Katsuki Bakugo was never one for such trivial things not out of malice but of necessity. To a hammer, every solution looked like a nail and his Quirk, his very self, was not suited for such things. He was the fire and the thunder. He was a sword, to strike down those that needed to be dealt with swiftly and without a mercy, not a shield meant to defend the meek and the helpless.  
  
Yet that classmate in the arms of the hedgehog-looking bastard… wasn’t meek. Wasn’t helpless.  
  
Despite what his classmates thought, Bakugo did pay attention to the world around him, had watched with an burning intensity as his classmates proved whom were his peers… and his betters… in the battlefield.  
  
That one… was not a slouch and even Bakugo could forgive such a farce as being captured by some-no-name mook in an environment that was a literal hell to anyone not equipped to handle it. The cloudy bastard had to either be incredibly stupid or still smarting over what Goldilocks had done to him to actually send someone like Katsuki Bakugo here.  
  
There could no better playground for him.  
  
Just as there could be no greater hell for Tsuyu Asui.  
  
“Alright! This-! This is how it’s going to go!” yelled the villain, shrill and shrieking in his fear as he meant the demon’s gaze with quivering shoulders and trembling knees. “You-You’re going to let me walk out of here and-and the-the girl-she lives!”  
  
Katsuki Bakugo snorted. “Yeah, like I’d believe that for a second, dumbass! Here’s how it’s _really_ going to go! For every second you hold her in your grasp, it’s another minute I get to spend teaching you why you and the rest of these idiots shouldn’t have taken one step into this school! At least… after my friend behind you has his fun first!”  
  
As though by unspoken command, another explosion erupted from behind the villain and he whirled to face nothing but flaring flames and explosive wind. By the time he had realized the trick, Bakugo was already upon him, palms blasting him forward like a human rocket. The villain’s luck continued to hold as the volatile teen opted to utilize his boot rather than his explosive fists to the man’s face. The blow sent the man flying backwards, dropping his hostage whom was caught by surprisingly gentle arms.  
  
Bakugo spared a quick glance to the floor and grinned ferally at what he saw. _That’s twenty! Suck it, Tifa! I beat your record!_ Then his attention was upon the girl in his arms, or rather, the quill in her neck. While not a doctor, triage was just one of many things a hero was expected to know. Of course, just because he had the no-how didn’t necessarily mean he had the experience of a nurse’s touch.  
  
“Ah!” Tsuyu Asui awoke with a gasp, the needle in her neck removed with all the grace of a splinter being extracted by an overly enthusiastic crustacean.  
  
“Please, it’s not even bleeding.” Bakugo grunted though he remained crouched down beside her, looking over her with a scowl that could almost be mistaken for disdain if his eyes didn’t linger on Tsuyu’s neck. “You good to walk?”  
  
“Kero? I-I think so…?” Tsuyu pushed herself to her feet and felt the world beneath her suddenly tilt on its axis. She started to fall only to have her sudden trip be halted by a gauntleted arm holding her up.  
  
“Pathetic. You ain’t going to be helping anyone out in that state, Tiana.” He grunted.  
  
She blinked. “My name is Tsuyu.”  
  
“Think you can hold on to me while I get us out of here, Tiana?” asked Bakugo, either ignorant or outright ignoring her by this point.  
  
“Yes, kero.”  
  
“Good,” Bakugo hefted her up onto his back, waiting with cool indifference as her legs wrapped themselves around his waist and her arms clung over his clavicle. _Hm, nice legs. She might actually beat my record if I’m not careful._ Bakugo grinned maliciously to himself as he envisioned all the ways he could keep ahold of his title in the days ahead.  
  
“Where are we going, kero?”  
  
“ _I_ am going to get us the fuck out of here and drop your royal butt off somewhere so I can keep kicking these shit-lords’ asses!” grunted Bakugo, palms facing downward and letting off an explosion that carried him and his passenger upwards like a rocket.  
  
Tsuyu blinked, shaking her head slightly. Whatever in that quill had to be doing something weird with her brain because she could have sworn Bakugo had just called her—  
  
“Oi, Frog Princess, don’t you fucking fall back asleep! I feel that tongue of your drooling on me, I’m drop-kicking you into the nearest pond you hear me?!”  
  
… _Well, I guess there are worse names to be called…_ “Kero… Like I’d want such a foul taste on my tongue.”  
  
“The fuck?! That’s your gratitude for carrying your amphibious butt?!” Bakugo snarled, glaring back at her for a moment before focusing on the course ahead. She was doing fine if she was back to her snarky self, which left him a moment to wonder once more…  
  
 _Where the fuck are Tifa and Deku?!_  
  


* * *

  
It moved at a sedate pace.  
  
It had no means to move faster and even if it could, it would not.  
  
The horde, those lesser playthings of The Successor of the One, fled at its approach and those that did not learned the error of their hesitation as flesh turned to bone. Its every breath was acidic exhale, turning flesh to ashes and leaving not but bleached bones behind. Sludge and grime followed in its steady tread, poisoning an already emaciated earth for decades to come.  
  
This, from the simple act of breathing. This from the ordinary motion of walking.  
  
Death just from simply being alive.  
  
It had no heart.  
  
Emotion could not exist in it.  
  
Feeling should not exist in it.  
  
Yet…  
  
Yes…  
  
Yes, there was… satisfaction… in the reactions of those that stupid before it. One boy and a girl. One unknown and one, very familiar, very recognizable face.  
  
Changed as it was, hurt as it had been, and damaged beyond all hope of repair. Its mind all but gone amidst the sludge and the slime that was its body, there existed within, a fragment of memory.  
  
What it had been once upon a time.  
  
It remembered them. They who were it and it who is now them.  
  
It remembers **_You._** The last face it saw before the change, the hurt, and the damage.  
  
It should not with but a piece of half-buried memory.  
  
It could not with nary a fragment of a mind no longer human.  
  
But it does remember. It’s the only memory it has to call its own.  
  
And it hates it.  
  
It hates **_You…_**  
  
It hates, hates, hates, hates, hates, HaTes, hAtEs, HATES, HATES!  
  
HAAAATESSSSSS!!!  
  
They move in two different directions. The girl approaching with arms held out as though in welcome, but it cared not for her.  
  
It cares for **_You._**  
  
It wants **_You_** to be changed as it was changed. It wants you to hurt as it had been hurt. It wants you damaged beyond all repair.  
  
More than this… It wants **_You DEAD!_**  
  
The sound it makes, it is a roaring deluge of slime and muck, a drowned man’s final exclamation, and the burbling of the welcoming darkness of the abyss. It turns after **_You_** , heedless of the swiftly running girl. It does not notice them anymore with **_You_** beneath its hellish gaze. It moves now with speed, an acceleration almost fluidlike in motion.  
  
Its eyes never leave its roiling mass as it chases and hunts. It has **_You_** in its sights now.  
  
It will not stop.  
  
Not under Command.  
  
Not by an Order.  
  
Not until **_You_** are—!  
  
It splatters and bounces and splits amidst a cacophony of gonging bells. It trembles here, there, and bits and pieces everywhere. The girl, the one with hair of auburn and eyes of red, she stands between it and **_You_** with arms outstretched. She speaks at **_You_** , tells **_You_** to run, that she will hold it back.  
  
She lies.  
  
Unknowingly she does so.  
  
But it’s a lie all the same.  
  
It comes together swiftly, toweringly, and moves once more with tentacled limbs outstretched. They meet an unseen barrier and bounce off to the sound of church bells ringing.  
  
It stops.  
  
It thinks.  
  
It shouldn’t.  
  
It couldn’t.  
  
But it does.  
  
And it plans.  
  
It moves towards her again, the same slow gait as ever before and more viscous gases of miasmic properties expel from it. She holds tight against her mouth a respiratory mask and the unseen barrier expands outwards in a vicious circle, flinging aside whatever and whoever cannot hold its ground.  
  
It approaches the edge of the barrier and slowly, ever so slowly, envelops it. It moves slowly, carefully, and spreads itself outward and upward. She speaks but it has no ears for her.  
  
It has eyes for **_You._**  
  
How pale **_You_** turn… How frightened **_You_** have become… Will **_You_** do as **_You_** had done then? Will the legs beneath **_You_** carry you forward without a thought again? Its head arises, crimson gaze aglow with all of its hate as it finds **_You_** and—!  
  
 ** _PAIN!_**  
  
 ** _AGONY!  
  
IT HURTS!  
  
WHY?!_**  
  
 ** _HOW DOES IT HURT?!_**  
  
The sound it makes is the same as before but there’s a desperate pitch to it, a frantic fear as whole pieces of itself withers away as dust on the wind. It reels itself back away from the invisible dome, turning and panting and raging at what caused it to feel once more.  
  
It sees a gaping hole in a building, follows the trail of saurian footprints towards a beast of draconic lightning, a hellion of golden scales.  
  
A monster? Is what it thinks.  
  
Strange, is what it wonders. It had thought there were no other monsters here.  
  
It bellows, furious at a betrayal and the answer is a sneer of fangs and a voice, a human voice, calling out in challenge as it speaks with a strange trinity of noise.  
  
“Come and face us, Hedorah! Come and face your demise!”  
  
…?  
  
That was not its name…  
  
It had no heart, so it could not feel.  
  
It had no mind, so it could not think.  
  
Yet…  
  
It liked the sound of that name all the same and took it for itself.  
  
It moved swiftly, body twisting and curling and swirling. The golden one moved in kind, taking massive strides with horned head held high above the miasmic fog. Pieces of itself jutted forward just as lightning alighted in the jaws of the beast and a massive bolt shattered straight through its amorphous body.  
  
It screamed again, broiling and boiling and moved back and away. It heaves more poison, hurls more of itself, and throughout it all, it screamed its burbling cry.  
  
Its breath ignored. Its acidic body missing their mark of golden splendor as lightning cleaved at it like a butcher’s knife. The sound of its pain and fury little more than music to the ears of a monster.  
  
Pain, a familiar pain, erupted within its right eye as a light, bright and sparkling and dazzling, exploded forth like a javelin and struck the beast dead center with thunderous force. The monster skidded back, clawed feet and hands digging a trail of the softened loam beneath him.  
  
It stood, heaving, one eye gleaming with hate and the other clenched tightly shut against the familiar pain.  
  
The beast did not move to the attack.  
  
The monster stood, head held high with widened eyes and slackened jaws. It knew not the expressions of beasts, but the creature seemed almost surprised and perhaps, yes, perhaps even a bit horrified. The beast whispered something strange, something it almost couldn’t quite hear.  
  
“Aoyama…?”  
  
That was not its name…  
  
It had no heart, so it should not feel.  
  
It had no mind, so it should not remember.  
  
Yet… it was afraid to die a second time.  
  
It arose once more to the attack, eye duct erupted with shining, dazzling light once more, its body swelling in girth even as the beast shrinks back in horror.  
  


* * *

  
 _“WHY? Why would you allow this—THIS TRAVESTY?!”_  
  
Anger, in its truest form, is little more than a double-edged sword. True it may aid in the striking down enemies, but so too can it hurt its wielder and those closest to them. Toshinori Yagi was well acquainted with anger, had seen firsthand the destructive force it could bring to bear. He wasn’t the most brilliant individual, but he wasn’t stupid either.  
  
So here he was, on the shores of Dagobah Beach trying to process… everything.  
  
 _“YOUR OWN SON! YOU WOULD DO THIS TO YOUR OWN FLESH AND BLOOD?! WHY?!”_  
  
Toshinori stood in his true form, fists clenching and unclenching as he stared down at the waves lapping against his shoes. His forelocks danced limply in the wind, dangling before his eyes and drawing them upward towards the distant horizon. He imagined, for just a moment, that the source of his anger, his turmoil, was there, in the distance.  
  
 _“Because it was the right thing to do for him.”_  
  
Muscles bulged, sagging flesh tightening over a sudden increase of mass. A fist clenched tightly, arm pulling back to strike—!  
  
 _“And for you as well, Toshinori Yagi.”_  
  
And stopped.  
  
Teeth gritting so tightly it was a miracle they hadn’t cracked under the pressure, Toshinori’s ever present smile was strained upon his face but it remained all the same despite the anger welling deep within his heart. He let out a quiet sigh like a deflating balloon, body shrinking away to a humbled form once more.  
  
 _“… I will tell him the truth. You cannot convince me otherwise.”  
  
“I cannot. I leave that task up to your own heart, Toshinori.”_  
  
His phone started ringing in his pocket. Toshinori flinched, recalling that the end of a once civil conversation had begun with such a sound. He slowly reached for it.  
  
 _“Young Midoriya—_ Izuku _— he deserves to know the truth of what has been done to him!”  
  
“He does but who should tell him? You? The man whom he admires more than anyone else in the entire world?”_  
  
“Principal, my apologies, but I’m afraid that I—” He blinked at the hurried interruption. “… What?! Villains?! At U.A.?!”  
  
 _“Or the father he has never met?”_  
  
Heroic form restored, priorities in their proper place and order, an explosion of sand heralding his skyward bound towards the school and smile still straining on his face.  
  
 _“You tell me that I should be honest, that I should lay down the sins I have carried for_ years _before the eyes of my son, but can you tell me honestly that you have done the same, Toshinori? What truths have you shared with my son? Have you told him of your predecessor? Have you told him of the identity of the one that struck that blow to your chest?  
  
“Have you even told him your name?”_  
  


* * *

  
Izuku grimaced against the wretched stench assaulting his senses. Even clear across the way away from the fighting between his class president and the creature, the ones that he heard the villains call “Nomu” but Marumaru-kaichou called “Hedorah,” the monster’s stench alone made the air difficult to breath. Add in its poisonous gases, well, both Izuku had no choice but to withdraw from the fight.  
  
 _Tifa-chan will be fine under her Absolute Territory. She should have a few hours of air in her tank, I need to find Aizawa-sensei and help—!_  
  
Izuku nearly tripped as he caught sight of Aizawa. The man stood amidst a field of bones and melting flesh. His attire was in rags, cuts and stab wounds decorating naked flesh in wetly red hues. His capture weapon was tattered, its edges frayed and decaying as discolored gases ate away at it. The pro-hero was struggling to breathe, the air around him almost fully depleted of oxygen.  
  
The cause stood opposite of the man, blades held at either side and still dripping with his blood.  
  
Aizawa was breathing harshly, more than he had been when facing the immeasurably horde. He swallowed a bit of bile back down in his throat and clenched his fists tightly as he readied for another approaching blow.  
  
Rather than take the opening, his opponent once more started to slowly approach him, her swords cutting aside whatever bones and bits of sinew happened to be in her way as she moved. “You feel it don’t you, Eraser Head? That shortness of breath?”  
  
“It’s been… a hell of a day,” said Aizawa, falling to one knee as darkness started to intercede its way at the edges of his vision.  
  
“Oh, Eraser Head, you have _no idea_ what Hell is, but you needn’t worry about that. You’ll be dead and gone long before it comes to Japan a second time.”  
  
His eyes narrowed beneath his goggles. “You keep… saying my name… got one of your own…?”  
  
“Ah, that’s right… That’s another part of this game isn’t it? The names? Names that the cattle put on their pedestals or quake at the merest mention.” That disgusting sound, the insidious noise that was her voice, grated against his ears as she raised her swords high. “My name is Akane Shigaraki but you and the rest of this pathetic world will know me by another name. I am—!”  
  
“SMASH!”  
  
A flurry of emerald lightning, an explosion of displaced air, a punch to shake the very Earth down to its foundations… The blow came directly to Akane’s torso and for all the force that Izuku had put behind it, such power was a minute percentage of what lay within his body. Yet, it was enough to send her skidding back, swords impaling into the ground to keep her from falling over. When she at last came to a stop, she stood hunched over, her ragged locks of hair falling over her face as she wheezed and struggled to breath.  
  
“Problem… child…!” Aizawa groaned out before he succumbed at last to his wounds, falling into the sweet embrace of unconsciousness. Izuku caught him and gently laid him down. He looked up sharply towards Shigaraki as her ragged, furious gasps expelled further clouds of discolored gas. It was not the sound of her breathing that had caught his fearful attention but the utterance of a word, a name.  
  
“Midoriya…” She hissed in disdain. “You… you are his successor…?”  
  
Izuku’s eyes widened, his face growing pale. _She-How-Impossible-But-?!_  
  
“This weak, pathetic… DEKU?! Where is his power?! Where is his fury?! WHERE IS HE?!” She screamed loud enough for most of the USJ to hear. As the last echoes of her scream faded away, she uttered a clouded sigh, shoulders slumping in sudden exhaustion. She stood upright and sheathed her swords, uncaring of the blood that still dripped along their serrated edge.  
  
“This day… disappoints me…” she rasped. She turned her head slightly, eyes looking past Izuku. Even with the mask on her face, Izuku could tell she was smiling. “Ah… but it’s about to get so much better…”  
  
Izuku turned and despite the situation he and Aizawa-sensei were in, couldn’t stop the scream that erupted out from his throat as the monster, the creature she named Nomu, overwhelmed Marumaru in a massive tidal wave of sludge and grime. Izuku’s sound of horror wasn’t the only one rending its way through the air as the majority of Class 1-A at last arrived on the scene just in time to witness their class president’s demise. A golden arm reached outwards through the sludge, clawed hands grasping at air before it too was swallowed into the beast.  
  
Unseen and unnoticed by all, No. 13 stood, arm slowly, ever so slowly, raising itself upwards as their body began to tremble and quake. They saw the number of students standing between them and the Nomu. Just another statistic, another sin, to drag them further into the depths of Hell when they finally passed from this world. Hand outstretched forward, it would take a familiar twitch of the fingers to undo the latch, to unleash the Black Hole once more, and at last bring an end the monster before it. It would mean the ending of all the innocent lives standing between No. 13 and the Nomu, including a fellow Pro-Hero, but such was the law when it came to Keter-Type Quirks.  
  
Quirks, such as Thirteen’s own, that were capable of ending human life on a monumental scale.  
  
To stop such a Quirk from being used for ill, to prevent another Tokyo…  
  
There was no such thing as casualty.  
  
Only results.  
  
No. 13 steeled their nerves and hardened their heart beneath a block of ice, hand in mid-motion when it happened.  
  
A spark of lightning danced briefly across the body of the Nomu. Another, small and fast as the first, arced across an outstretched tentacled limb. A third, dancing between its eyes. More and more appeared and where they struck, ashes fell from the drying skin of the Nomu as it reared back its head to loose a scream—  
  
 **KRAKOOM!**  
  
Only for a storm of lightning to erupt outwards from where it had once stood. The bolts arced upwards, striking against the metallic ceiling and piercing through it like a spear of heavenly light. The scattered remains of the Nomu fell as ashes and dried husks.  
  
It was dead.  
  
And the murderer stood with claws clenching tightly upon the ground, clothing little more than halfway decent rags upon his golden frame. Twin tails lay still and silent upon the earth, serpentine neck bent down as draconic jaws heaved great gasps of air before hellion eyes opened wide with demonic intensity. The head with its horned crown arose upwards.  
  
[“▂▂▃▃▄▄▅▅!!”](https://wikizilla.org/w/images/2/22/King_Ghidorah_2019_SFX.ogg)  
  
To those in the USJ, to a great many people, it was a roar. Fierce, terrible, and awful but a roar all the same. No one could know, not a one of them could possibly suspect, that such a thing, such a fierce, terrible, awful noise, could traverse so far.  
  
Such a sound was never meant for the ears of humanity though many both in and out of the grounds of U.A. heard it clear as day. They could hear it clearly but not a man, woman, or child could ever truly understand the message, the declaration, buried amidst that deep and terrible exclamation.  
  
Like ripples in a once motionless pond, it traveled ever outwards. Those few humans that heard it, dismissed it off as little more than thunder or a passing figment of their overactive imagination. Of those that heard and understood however…  
  
It was so much more.  
  


* * *

  
 _34°41′38″N 135°30′8″E_  
  
The shrine had stood well through the centuries since its creation. The family that stewarded it had been both plentiful and attentive, but such a thing was in the past at a time when such things as war were but whispered rumors from passerby. The family was all but extinct now and what few members that were left did not care to keep up the ancient traditions of guardianship over the shrine save for one and even he had fallen onto old vices.  
  
He sat at the forefront of the temple grounds, beneath the torii gates that stood at the precipice of the winding slope of stone stairs. He rested in a meditative pose, still and silent as stone for so long that a nest had actually started to be constructed atop his head, just between the two canine ears that drooped down near his closed eyes.  
  
[ **...!**](https://wikizilla.org/w/images/2/22/King_Ghidorah_2019_SFX.ogg)  
  
One of his ears twitched upwards, startling the little bird away from his head. The other ear joined it, carefully listening as the echoes continued on outwards to any and all whom could hear it. A mouth opened, canine fangs gleaming as the figure sighed a faint cloud of stony dust before a pair of glimmering, jewel-like eyes opened.  
  
“So… you’re still alive after all…”  
  


* * *

  
 _18°5′12″N 67°53′22″W_  
  
There is a saying that no matter where you go, no matter what land you would travel to, there is one thing that they all share equally. The sky is never different, no matter if the land below was a frozen wasteland or a tropical paradise. It is a special kind of freedom that only those who can fly under their own power can both appreciate and understand. And for someone like him, there was no greater relief from the shackles of honor and duty that bound him so on the earth below than to be up in the open air and—  
  
[ **...!**](https://wikizilla.org/w/images/2/22/King_Ghidorah_2019_SFX.ogg)  
  
Wings once spread in a gentle glide suddenly came crashing downwards. The sudden uplift carried him high into the air, just beneath the stratus layer of clouds. He spun tightly in place, head turning this way and that as avian eyes tried and failed to find the source of the sound that echoed still within his chest and ears.  
  
“¡Chingada madre! ¡¿Qué demonios fue eso?!”  
  


* * *

  
 _40°39′40″N 73°56′38″W_  
  
A jungle of steel, a forest of glass… To those trapped below on the ground, navigating this maze of gleaming towers and enormous skyscrapers was nothing short of maddening. For one like her, it was a breeze but then, her routes were far more scenic than those who simply lacked both the means and imaginations to utilize their skills however they could.  
  
Especially if such means were slightly less than legal.  
  
Parkour in itself was technically not illegal. Sure, if you’re caught on private property you can get cited, fined, and maybe even arrested for trespassing, but most tended to miss the most important part of that sentence.  
  
 _If._  
  
Utilizing a Quirk without the proper license was something of a mixed bag, especially in this particular part of the world. While not lacking for Quirks in its populace like every other country both major and minor in the world, it was proving exceptionally difficult to limit Quirk usage to Pro-Heroes when a great many Quirks were either integral to one’s own being or provided a service that, while arguably not suitable for heroics, certainly aided in the common man.  
  
While lacking in the latter, the former was something she possessed in spades. In fact—!  
  
[ **...!**](https://wikizilla.org/w/images/2/22/King_Ghidorah_2019_SFX.ogg)  
  
“Whoa!” She skidded to a halt, arms swirling and claws catching and piercing through concrete like it was little more than dirt beneath her digits. She clung to the side of the building, roundabout ten stories above the ground and remained perfectly still for a long moment trying to still her suddenly frantic heart.  
  
She looked over her shoulder, towards the western horizon with a frown on her young face before another noise drew her attention to the window next to her and the stern looking security guard standing behind it. She smiled and offered a quick salute before continuing her race up to the tallest tower in the greatest city in the world.  
  


* * *

  
Izuku wavered on his feet, shaking his head to clear it of the ringing sound of Marumaru’s roar and trying to shake away the surprising surge of… something… deep within his chest. A flare of emotion he had been no stranger to and yet never truly acquainted with either. It had been directed at him, wielded against him time and time again, but rare was the day that Izuku Midoriya felt it for himself.  
  
A feeling that was unknowingly shared for an entirely different reason.  
  
“No…” Shigaraki hissed. “No… NonoNONONONO!”  
  
She suddenly loosed a banshee cry, approaching at speeds towards Izuku and the unconscious Aizawa, blades drawn once more. A purple fog erupted between them, her blades penetrated deeply into the cloud that was Kurogiri and she sneered beneath her mask.  
  
“You are in my way, Kurogiri…” She rasped. Her voice eerily calm once more though her shoulders quivered with the intensity of her rage. “Give me a reason, one reason, why I shouldn’t just kill you?”  
  
“The Iida child got away and reinforcements are no doubt mere moments away as we speak, Shigaraki.” Kurogiri grimaced, the feeling of her swords piercing through his misty form only a quarter as unpleasant as the sound of the young woman’s voice. His eyes, lacking pupils, gave no hint as to whom he was looking at as he addressed Shigaraki. “There is no greater shame for a hero than that of failure. He will hear of this… and he will know how close he had come to losing his successor… and then…”  
  
“I will kill them both… He will watch… as I had watched… As I take _everything_ from him…!” She hissed lowly, misty gases pouring like steam through the fangs of her mask. “… Very well. Live these coming days well, little successor. They’ll be your last.”  
  
Shigaraki slowly stepped backwards, removing her swords from Kurogiri and started to disappear into the warp gate he had created at her back.  
  
“W-Wait! Is that why you’ve done all this? To try and kill All Might and—?!” Izuku cut himself off. Even if this villain had some idea as to his connection to All Might, he couldn’t, _wouldn’t_ —!  
  
“All Might?” She laughed, a dry, hacking noise like she had no idea how to actually make such a sound. “Do you know, the thought never crossed my mind even once? No… This… all of this… Was just to kill you… Heir to the King!”  
  
And she was gone.  
  


* * *

  
In his office deep within the Hero Public Safety Commission, Yokumiru Mera repressed another long and frankly exhausting yawn. He was beat tired, a seemingly perpetual state of being for a man who was not even in his forties yet but looked and acted like one a few decades past that. He wondered if he could possibly sneak in a couple minutes’ worth of rest before anyone got wise when The Phone rang.  
  
He blinked.  
  
He turned slowly, carefully, and looked at The Phone.  
  
It was ringing.  
  
A bead of sweat traveled down his brow and past a face ashen white.  
  
 _I knew I should have slept in this morning…_  
  
“Hey, Mera, pick up your damn—” A fellow slave to the government stuck their head around the corner of his cubicle, face set in a snide sneer until their eyes set themselves upon The Phone.  
  
Mera made a note to file a complaint of improper Quirk usage to upper management. No way could someone disappear that quickly with some kind of superpower.  
  
Of course, if he were a braver man, or at the least a more well-rested one, he’d have joined them. Probably outraced them if he had his forty winks rather than his forty seconds of rest. The Phone was something that was equal parts a legend and a horror story among the HPSC. When it had first been brought it, The Phone was the responsibility of a singular individual.  
  
Poor bastard lasted a week before he broke.  
  
The next one, a stone-cold bitch, managed five days.  
  
The third…  
  
Well, they had leapt out the window at the mere mention of the thing becoming their responsibility. They survived of course, literally bouncing back into the room to apology for their hasty departure which resulted in the replacing of a window some ten-odd stories up off the ground.  
  
Sensing a pattern by this point, the higher-ups finally got their heads out of their asses long enough to come up with a conceivable plan that wouldn’t result in either mass mutiny or a full governmental shut-down. As a means of “alleviating undo stress,” The Phone had a daily rotation. For approximately twenty-four hours, it was the responsibility of one person before said individual could pass it along to the next schmuck in line.  
  
Today was Yokumiru Mera’s day.  
  
Sensing the eyes were undoubtedly aimed at his back, he reached over to The Phone and answered it.  
  
“Hello.”  
  
It was in that moment that those near enough to hear him were torn in deciding whether the balls in Mera’s possession were of a brass-like quality or he was well and truly too tired to give any kind of shits.  
  
“I kind of figured it was but I had hoped otherwise.”  
  
Opinions still wavered though some were starting to lean on the side of tiredness.  
  
“Neat.”  
  
A clear-cut lead was made, tiredness for the—  
  
“I’ll be sure to let my boss know. Have a nice day.”  
  
He hung up and, in that moment, it was decided.  
  
Balls of titanium.  
  
Mera turned slowly in his chair to face… pretty much everybody currently working in his floor today, including the janitor girl. Some of them looked at him in awe, others in fear, and, in the case of the janitor girl, open confusion. In her defense, the worst she ever had to deal with was cleaning up after a literal zoo’s worth of shit—which was where Mera decided was an excellent reason to focus at the present task at hand.  
  
He had already gone down one rabbit hole. He was not ready to try for the looking glass next.  
  
Mera casually reached over to his phone and dialed a quick number. It was answered within a second.  
  
“Ma’am, this is Yokumiru Mera. … Yes, I know. … Yes, I’m sure. … I’ll get right on that soon as I tell you why I called. … The Phone rang. … Yes, I’m quite sure since I answered it. … Well, those instructions got lost in transition then, ma’am because I sure as hell didn’t get them. … Yes. … Yeah, he did. … He said he’s coming back. … About a month I’d wager. … Well, given that there will likely be some opposition, I imagine that’s a more than fair assessment. … Really? … I’ll do that then, thank you, ma’am.”  
  
And with that, turned in his chair and calmly went to sleep even as most of his co-workers started a ruckus to make headless chickens look like quiet church mice in comparison. Not that Mera really cared at the moment.  
  
He had just been given a week’s paid leave.  
  
He sure as hell wasn’t going to miss one minute’s worth of rest before the real shit storm hit the fan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those unawares, this story is cross-posted from both Fanfiction.net and SpaceBattles.com. While the former is pretty much the story as seen here, the latter features a load of Informational posts pertaining to this story and also allows for some most artistic/stylistic choices.


	9. EPISODE 8.0: Generation

_I’m sick of all this waiting and people telling me what I should be.  
What if I’m not so crazy, maybe you’re the one who’s wrong not me. _

  
Toshinori Yagi was no stranger to death. Try as he might to prevent it whenever he could, the blond man had become well acquainted with it. Death was not a stranger though it was certainly no friend of his no matter how much closer it drew to him with every passing day. It shaped him then as it continued to shape him now, an ever-present reminder of his failings and his virtues. Standing at the precipice of the massive stairwell of the USJ, All Might wondered how these deaths would affect his students.  
  
“This was done by their leader?” he asked the detective standing at his side. Tsukauchi sighed and nodded, scratching his short black hair beneath the brim of his hat.  
  
“Most of them….”  
  
All Might nodded and politely ignored the sound of retching from one of the greener officers behind him and his old friend. It was a ghastly sight really. The callous ways the woman, an Akane Shigaraki, had cut limbs and bisected bodies simply for the fact that they stood within her reach. How the effects of her Quirk were less kind as they ate flesh from bone to such a degree the only indication that there had even been any meat on those bodies to begin with was the pools of blood beneath the skeletal remains.  
  
Aizawa was lucky that Young Midoriya had intervened when he did. Any longer within the mist of Shigaraki’s gas and he’d have suffered a similar fate. As it was, the man would undoubtedly be spending weeks under Recovery Girl’s not-so-tender mercies. He had, after all, lost nearly eighty percent of his skin…  
  
“Apparently the Nomu, or Hedorah depending on which of your students you ask, was responsible for the rest of that… mess.”  
  
Mess.  
  
An adequate word as any really. Flesh and muscle melted into a pool of meaty fluids wherein bits of bone floated in scattered pieces amidst the puddles of those that fell victim to the Nomu’s tread. _Such a thing… could it really have been—_  
  
“It was a Keter,” affirmed No. 13, hands still trembling within their gloves. “Marumaru-kun identified it as such.”  
  
“And you took him at his word?” questioned Tsukauchi, “A student who isn’t even a licensed Pro-Hero never mind a licensed—”  
  
“I believe that Thirteen took Marumaru-kun at his word because if the boy truly understands what a Keter-Type Quirk is,” interrupted Nezu coldly as he walked onto the scene, “then he undoubtedly knows the punishment for those who “cry wolf” as the Westerners say.”  
  
Toshinori repressed a grimace and looked away. That… was putting it mildly. Some of the worst examples of scum and villainy were fortunate to end up in places like Tartarus or Helheim. Those who fell under the standards of a Keter-Type Quirk?  
  
There is a far worse place than any Hell on this Earth.  
  
“However, if you wish to know if this Nomu met each of the Tanaka Standards, let’s look at the facts, shall we?” Nezu spoke up as he a raised a claw. “Control. The Nomu was quite obviously under the sway of this Akane Shigaraki who in turn allowed it to run rampant enough that when a student stood between it and its prey, it chose to still go after its intended target. In point of fact, the only reason it apparently deviated at all was because Marumaru-kun was capable of actually injuring it.”  
  
Another claw was raised.  
  
“Devastation. The Nomu’s every exhalation resulted in the release of enough poisonous vapors into the air that even now, the systems installed in the USJ, which are among the most advanced pieces of technology on this hemisphere, are _still_ having difficulties identifying. Of course, that’s just from it merely _breathing_. As evident by the remains, its body possessed a level of acidity that is as astounding as it is horrifying given that it could, in essence, consume and digest any raw material it came in contact with. Organic or otherwise.”  
  
Another.  
  
“Impact. From testimonies gathered from the students and evidence plain as the noses on our faces, we can surmise that the Nomu was, quite literally, composed entirely of pollutants of varying degrees of toxicity and, once more I must emphasize, highly acidic. The fact that we can even breathe the air in here at all is due entirely to the various air filters and other equipment and technologies installed, most of which are now in dire need of repair or replacement as those that were in closer proximity to the Nomu appear to have _melted_.”  
  
Finally, all four claws were raised.  
  
“Morality.” Nezu merely gestured below to the remains being gathered far below. “Need I actually say anything further?”  
  
Tsukauchi winced and pulled the flap of his hat down to shadow his eyes. “You _know_ that I have to ask these kind of questions, Principal Nezu because if not me then one of—”  
  
“A Suit was already here and gone before you started in on one of _my_ teachers, Detective.” Nezu interrupted with a sniff of his snout. “They were… satisfied with the results of Marumaru’s actions though I am afraid they may have some words to say in your hesitating, Thirteen. At the very least, your license for such matters may be up for review.”  
  
No. 13’s hands clenched tightly but did not respond beyond a tightly controlled nod.  
  
Toshinori however, tried and failed to swallow back the lungful of blood that nearly erupted out of his mouth. “Wh-Which Suit was it?”  
  
“Diamond, thank heavens. That one at least has some proper appreciation for a good cup of tea.” Nezu nodded. “Though that does remind me, how did your luncheon with Mrs. Midoriya go, Toshinori-kun?”  
  
Somehow, even with the loss of it, Toshinori felt his stomach drop at that.  
  


* * *

“The fodder _wasted_ …!”  
  
CRASH!  
  
“The Nomu _gone_ …!”  
  
SMASH!  
  
“Kurogiri, _broken_ …!”  
  
BAM!  
  
“The intel was wrong! You were wrong! SENSEI!”  
  
 ** _“I was not. You were simply not prepared enough, my dear. You underestimated them and their tenacity.”_**  
  
“Them? THEM?! I don’t care about _them!_ ” SMASH! “A bunch of heroic little, delusional bastards and bitches, the whole lot of them! Claiming themselves as heroes!” CRASH! “Liars! Like all of the rest of them!”  
  
 ** _“And what’s this I hear of the Nomu? You did not actually leave it behind, did you?”_**  
  
“No! It—! It was destroyed. By that golden-scaled bastard! How was that miserable thing supposed to kill _him_ if it couldn’t even kill a mere brat?!”  
  
 ** _“Oh, my dear… There is nothing “mere” about_** HIM ** _. Think of this as another lesson. Monsters, true monsters, come in all shapes and sizes but always and forever from where you least expect them.”_**  
  
“That brat… both of those BRATS…!”  
  
 ** _“Naturally, you should be upset over this loss but take heart, my dear. This was not a futile exercise. The elite are aware of you now. Take your time, my dear. Take as much of it as you need. As the world is now, people like us… we cannot move beyond the stretching darkness of the shadows. This is why they —why we— need a symbol. A symbol, like you.”_**  
  
“Sensei… I…”  
  
 _ **“Akane Shigaraki. When next you step out into the light, show the world why you should be feared. Become the**_ Destroyer _ **you were always meant to be.”**_  
  


* * *

 _How could this have happened…?_  
  
Itsuki sat in his desk with his eyes closed, feigning rest once more as his classmates talked around him. He had spent the better part of yesterday trying and failing to come to some sort of understanding within himself. Itsuki tried to follow the string through the labyrinth of his life and find which corner it was that he had turned, what path he might have taken, that had resulted in such drastic changes to the timeline That One had witnessed.  
  
A different Class 1-A, he could accept. His mere existence alone was proof of concept that the river of history, no matter how set into the course it may be, could still be diverted. An entirely different Shigaraki? One whose Quirk was no less devastating in design and scope? A Nomu that had the potential to not only kill All Might back in his prime but to have in its possession a Quirk that belonged to one of the rightful students of Class 1-A?  
  
That was too many changes, all of them too diverse in scope to ignore and simply write off as a ripple effect. He had done everything short of finding a cave to dwell in for the last several years since he woke up in that hospital bed so once again…  
  
 _How could this have happened?_  
  
The Nomu… It was far too different from what That One had seen. It was far deadlier for one… in point of fact, it was better to say that it was far more efficient in what it was designed for. For all intents and purposes, this one could have killed All Might, or at the least had an easier time of it than it could have with the Quirks it should have possessed. Enhanced strength, high-speed regeneration, and shock absorption. True, such a thing could—and _had_ —stood well against All Might but it was… wrong. **No. It was _foolish._**  
  
 _No…_ Itsuki frowned, clawed finger tapping gently upon his desk. _It was foolish._  
  
Why create something to kill the Symbol of Peace and make it be capable of matching him blow-for-blow? Why go through all that effort, all that trouble, to craft something that was, in essence, a distorted reflection of the man himself? That one had been… a joke… in the long run of horrors that would follow in its wake.  
  
Hedorah’s body was both incredibly toxic and highly acidic. Direct physical contact would put All Might at risk of serious injury if not outright death. Distance attacks would be no better for they ran the risk of spreading the acid and Hedorah’s poisons. It was also quite evident that Hedorah could control its separated parts and it was highly likely the damned thing could even self-duplicate if given enough time and resources.  
  
That it had Aoyama’s Quirk Navel Laser… Sure, the blast had come from a tear duct in one of its eyes but the light, the sheer splendor of the beam… Why that? Out of all the Quirks that Hedorah possessed, that one made the least amount of sense for it to have. Was it some sort of long-range attack?  
  
A̶̢̲͌̐ ̴͇͈̈́͜͝r̵̡͖̥̔e̴̘̣̝̓̓̇m̴͓͂i̷͍͆͆n̵̼̚d̶͚̋ȇ̶̜̗͂r̵̘̼̎.̷̨͂̑  
  
Itsuki shook his head, scowling as his now clawed fingertips rubbed at his scalp.  
  
Then there was the leader of the attack. Itsuki hadn’t heard her name outright himself, but in the aftermath… He had heard it clear as day and nearly lost what little hold of himself that he managed to regain in the aftermath of the attack.  
  
 _Akane Shigaraki… The same last name but clearly a different person entirely…_ Not unreasonable given that Tomura Shigaraki had been an alias from the start but… _Why that same name? She clearly doesn’t have the same Quirk as Tomura does-did-whatever! I mean, there are some similarities but—_  
  
Any further thought Itsuki had to the matter was interrupted by the sound of the door opening and many a student exclaiming in shock, surprise, and even horror. Itsuki turned to look and grimaced at the sight. The man was not only wrapped from head to toe in bandages, he was begrudgingly dragging an oxygen tank behind him with the connected mask all but stapled to his face. As it was, more than a few, arguably necessary, bandages held it in place over the man’s face.  
  
“Morning _-hic-whirr-_ class.” Aizawa’s gruff voice had a faint, synthetic undertone to it as his respirator let out a faint and far-too-familiar sound to Itsuki’s ears. His tails twitched beneath his seat and twitched again when Tiffany turned slightly in her seat to look back towards him and offer a familiar hand sign.  
  
 _That doesn’t even fit into the context of this situation damn it!_  
  
Tenya’s hand shot up like a piston, “Aizawa-sensei, are you sure you are alright?”  
  
“I find _-hic-whirr-_ your lack of faith _-hic-whirr-_ disturbing.”  
  
Itsuki did not slam his head into his desk nor did he give Tiffany the satisfaction of looking at her as she gave him a grin that had even Bakugo of all people edging his chair further away from her.  
  
“Besides, there’s little time _-hic-whirr-_ for you kids to waste before you face _-hic-whirr-_ your greatest ordeal yet.”  
  
The students looked to each other, nervous and justifiably afraid.  
  
Aizawa’s head bowed low, allowing his eyes to be seen through the wrappings about his head. “The U.A. _-hic-whirr-_ Sports Festival is starting _-hic-whirr-_ soon.”  
  
“THAT’S SO NORMAL THOUGH?!”  
  


* * *

The lunch bell rang gently as Cementoss exited the classroom, literary book in his massive hands, leaving the students to their own devices. In simpler terms, he got the heck out of dodge before the students’ excitement got the better of them and just in time too as quite a few students all but exploded out of their seats with glee.  
  
Taking advantage of the distraction, Itsuki swiftly vacated the room and was surprised to find himself with company all but walking in his shadow.  
  
Fumiko glanced upwards at Itsuki, a mask of indifference upon her face that didn’t quite match the faint flush on her cheeks. A coloration that only deepened upon sighting the clear bemusement on Itsuki’s face. Not saying a word, Itsuki turned and started towards the cafeteria and, after a moment’s pause, the redhaired girl followed after him.  
  
As she trailed along behind him, Fumiko found her eyes once more drawn to Itsuki’s form, a thoughtful frown on her face as she trailed the generous length of his twin tails behind him. She watched as their bladed tips trailed to and fro in the air. Her eyes trailed down to his legs, digitigrade with saurian feet hidden beneath customized shoes, and then up towards his upper body and face, which she only now noticed was turned and looking at her, more amused than before.  
  
He tilted his head with a twitch tugging at the edge of his lips. “See something you like?”  
  
She blushed but didn’t rise to his bait. “More of a concern actually.”  
  
“Oh? What would that be?”  
  
“You’re not in your natural form, are you?”  
  
He stopped. **Kill her.** **Kill her now.**  
  
Itsuki turned fully around to face her, left hand clenching tightly and unseen by either of them. “What do you mean by that?” **What are you doing? Kill. Her. NOW.**  
  
“The way that you move… You walk with your upper body tilted slightly forward and more sway to your arms than the average person. It wasn’t until I saw you at the USJ that I finally put the pieces together. When you’re wearing your hero costume, your arms are far longer, and you walk with a quadruped’s gait. Your arms are supposed to be longer than they are now, but you’ve shrunk them down to more humanlike proportions.”  
  
“Huh.” Itsuki blinked. _Observant._ **Too observant.**  
  
Fumiko tilted her head. “Why would you do that? Limit yourself in such a way?”  
  
Itsuki didn’t even have to stop and think. “A lot of different reasons. The most prevalent would have to be the simplest of them. Training.”  
  
She blinked at that. “Training?”  
  
He nodded. “Make everything you do be some form of training. Got to go up a few floors, take the stairs. Walking towards school, walk atop the neighborhood fences and walls. You have a Quirk like mine, well, you should be exercising it at every available opportunity.”  
  
“I see…” Fumiko murmured, thoughts drifting to the tales of her and Rikido’s many-times great grandfather, a man whose legends permeated the Nerima Ward even to this day.  
  
“Speaking of training, you never did follow me up on that offer of yours,” said Itsuki, resuming the trek towards the cafeteria.  
  
“Offer?” Fumiko blinked. “Wait, you mean, a spar?”  
  
“Of course. From what I hear, I’m likely to be the only one in our class who’d be a willing partner for you.”  
  
She knew he meant sparring partner, she knew it, but that didn’t stop the spark of anger that glimmered beneath her glasses. “What do you mean by that?”  
  
He looked over his shoulder at her. “Chunky salsa?”  
  
She stumbled, thankfully not falling onto her face though she’d rather have the earth open up beneath her and swallow her whole. “I’m going to strangle Mina…”  
  
Itsuki chuckled. “Ah, you can’t blame her for bragging about it. From what I heard, you got some serious airtime with your hits and all without your Quirk too. Most impressive.”  
  
Fumiko looked up through her locks of auburn hair at him. “You are kind of weird, aren’t you?”  
  
“You have _no_ idea.”  
  


* * *

  
Toshinori Yagi was not, at his core, a liar. Oh certainly he omitted facts, kept his and others’ secrets tighter than a vault, but never, ever, would he lie outright. At least, that’s what he always told himself as the days became months and turned into years. As the emptiness in his torso was matched by the dwindling of his body’s health, where his “natural” form became a thing of horror, so too did his capacity to lie begin to develop and grow into a work of art.  
  
To himself and to his successor.  
  
Standing in his of the school’s many, many lounge offices, Toshinori eyed Midoriya with a small bead of sweat travelling down the back of his head. He had invited the boy to a private luncheon so that he could talk with him about the upcoming Sports Festival and Midoriya’s lack of control over his inherited Quirk.  
  
That had been the plan.  
  
That was the plan.  
  
It had been executed beautifully, if Toshinori could say so himself. Why, he even thought he could see the rainbows of light shining down upon young Midoriya as he urged the boy to step forward, to do his absolute best to declare to the world that “I am here!” just as he had done.  
  
Yet…  
  
“Is there something on your mind, Young Midoriya? There’s still a bit of time left before you have to hurry back to class, so if you have any questions for me…?” Perhaps the lad wanted some tips of how to succeed? Toshinori did not intend to divulge any “spoilers” to give his protégé an edge but—  
  
“You’re not secretly related to royalty are you All Might?”  
  
In all of his years as a Pro Hero, Toshinori could count on one hand the number of questions that had come at him from out of left field. Young Midoriya’s had come so far out from left field that Toshinori was fairly certain he had been struck by a football in place of a baseball. He swallowed back a gout of blood as he coughed and cleared his throat.  
  
“Wh-Where on Earth did you get an idea like that, Young Midoriya?”  
  
“I’m sorry! I—I just… back at the USJ… the leader… She… She said something to me before she left…”  
  
Toshinori nodded, his shoulders stiffening beneath his currently oversized clothes. Young Midoriya’s testimony, along with the rest of Class 1-A, had been in Tsukauchi-kun’s report to the staff that morning.  
  
“She called me… Heir to the King and—” Midoriya’s eyes bugged out as Toshinori loosed a positively massive amount of blood out of his mouth. “ALL MIGHT?!”  
  
Following a rather hectic clean-up, with far too many apologies than necessary, Toshinori counted each and every one of his lucky stars that the lunch bell had rung before he could have a chance to try and explain his… Reaction…  
  
Toshinori sunk deep into the couch, bony fingers rubbing at his brow. _No one warned me that being a teacher could be so stressful…_  
  
In his own private corner of the schoolgrounds, or rather that of Recovery Girl’s office and strapped tightly in place as he was forcibly fed a full meal rather than his atypical luncheon of a ration bar and juice pack, Aizawa suddenly felt the urge to laugh.  
  


* * *

  
Thirteen sat in the teacher’s office alone, nursing a lukewarm cup of coffee within their gloved grasp.  
  
The clock on the wall continued ticking onwards, the seconds hand twitching its way forward towards its peak. Between one second and the next, the chair across from Thirteen became occupied. Thirteen didn’t so much as twitch at the sudden appearance of the person now sitting across from them, one leg crossed over the other as gloved hands nursed a steaming cup of tea.  
  
After all, Thirteen was sitting alone in the teacher’s office.  
  
The individual across from them wore a suit. At a glance, it would not be indistinct from any other suit worn by a member of the government. Finely pressed, expertly tailored, and little to no other distinction save for one. Upon their chest, located directly over where their heart may lay, if they were in fact as human on the inside as they might be on the outside, was a single golden pin.  
  
A diamond.  
  
The one who occupied the chair opposite to Thirteen was a simple person.  
  
That was all.  
  
There could be some words used to describe them, Thirteen supposed, but they would have to be simple words. Tall. A bit on the slim side perhaps. Human? Possibly, it was always something fiercely debated in quiet whispers in hidden corners where regular people thought they were safe from prying eyes or listening.  
  
Such ridiculousness.  
  
No one escapes the notice of the Suits, especially not those whom bore the license, and thus the title of—  
  
“Jäger.”  
  
This time Thirteen twitched. Their eyes tracked over the empty room, spared a glance to the Suit across from them before resuming their listless stare down to the cup in their grasp.  
  
“Diamond.” Thirteen murmured. “Such an honor…”  
  
“Hm. I’m sure.”  
  
Indeed it was, if it was anything so simple as that. Few knew of them, fewer still had actually met with one, but not a one who had even the tiniest inkling of thought towards them could deny one solitary truth.  
  
The Suits are dangerous. Were dangerous. Could have been. Might be.  
  
Thirteen shook their head, hand pressing against their helm to stave off a headache. A chuckle startled them. They scanned the room again, more fervently than before, gave a nod of indication towards Diamond, and relaxed again at the reassurance that they were alone in the office space.  
  
The Suit, Diamond, yes, that was the name attributed. Because of the pin upon the chest. Above where a heart would lay. At least where a human heart might be in a human torso. Diamond brought a hand to hide a smile, not that they had need to do so.  
  
The Suits, in present tense, did not exist. Only in the past could they be recollected and even such fragmentary thoughts were comprised of the most important of matters. Matters such as—  
  
“You hesitated Jäger. There was a Keter within your sight and within grasp of your Quirk and you hesitated. I would hear why you did so.”  
  
Thirteen’s grip on their mug tightened, the porcelain creaking in their grasp as the Black Hole that was both their Body and their Quirk, strained against the confines of their containment. “There were too many civilians within the area. The cost of neutralizing the Keter was too great.”  
  
A clack of a cup against the table. Hands pressed against table, fingers shaped like claws, or perhaps claws shaped like fingers, scratch themselves against the glass. A tall and slim form leaned close, far too close from such a distance, as a breath cold as the grave flowed over Thirteen’s helmeted face. The pro-hero didn’t react to the sudden proximity of Diamond within their personal space.  
  
After all, they were the only one in the room.  
  
“Such a decision is not yours to be made prior to its commitment Jäger. Not when you readily took the lives of criminals tried and untried in the courts. Do not also try and sugarcoat the facts. Those civilians are all in training to become pro-heroes. Some of them may even be sitting where you are now, should they also emulate this unfortunate relapse of yours. Hypocrisy is not tolerated ailment in a Jäger.”  
  
“That was different.” Thirteen murmured. “The villains—they were…”  
  
“They were what? Trying to kill you? The students? If they hadn’t been, if they too were aware of the walking genocide that they had invited along to join them in their murderous foray, you would have laid them low just the same. Lie all you want to yourself but do not waste my time by trying to do the same to me. It never works out well for those involved.”  
  
A hand so very human and yet far too entirely inhuman, gently pressed claws like fingers upon Thirteen’s chest.  
  
“Not when your heart speaks so much more openly to me than your own conscience does to you.”  
  
A clicking of a cup, warm tea freshly filled to the brim and taken in a generous sip. The cold breath gone from Thirteen’s face, the malicious grasp over their heart gone like a bad dream, and Diamond sitting back in the chair with papers grasped lightly by fingers like claws. Papers rustled, pointed appendages idly flipping through them as indescribable eyes scanned the numerous images and names, each and every one different but united in sharing a few simple words amongst them.  
  
 **Status:** Inactive.  
  
 **Responding Jäger:** No. 13.  
  
“Your record defends you this time, Jäger. This one and only time. Should something like this happen again, the revoking of your license will be the least of your concerns.”  
  
A click of a pen, inked tip scratching lightly in cursive script. The written paper placed gently upon the table, a solid thump of a stamp across the picture printed in the top right corner.  
  
“Don’t forget. It is only because you hold that license that you are sitting here with me rather than being just another name on a sheet of paper. Would you kindly read and dispose of this please?”  
  
Thirteen nodded and startled to their feet as the bell rang throughout the halls of U.A., signaling the end of the luncheon hour. They shuddered where they stood, taking great heaving breathes of air as they slowly looked first to the empty chair across from them before turning their gaze down to the solitary piece of paper sitting beside a series of scratch marks decorating an otherwise pristine glass table.  
  
The pro-hero reached down with trembling fingers to grasp the paper and read its contents swiftly before swallowing it away with a quick burst of their Quirk. They looked about the room once more and visibly sagged with relief as the door opened and a few of their fellow teachers stepped inside.  
  
They were no longer alone in the room.  
  


* * *

  
The clock ticked forward towards twenty-one past three. Class 1-A’s doors were opened wide as they could and a veritable sea of people flooded the hallway outside their classroom, much to the surprise of many.  
  
“Wh-Wha-What’s going on?!” exclaimed Ochaco with wide, disbelieving eyes. She hadn’t seen so many students crammed into the hallways since the day the reporters had tripped the alarm, which, in hindsight, wasn’t really that long ago but really this was rather excessive! She swore she could see a few second and third-year students intermingled in the crowd!  
  
“What business do you have with Class 1-A?” asked Tenya, prim and proper and still riding the waves of his sergeant duties of ensuring the class had finished their afternoon chores both swiftly and without any dillydally.  
  
“Scouting out the competition, what else Mustang?” asked Bakugo as he calmly walked towards the open door, backpack carried over one shoulder without a care in the world.  
  
“M-Mustang?!” choked Iida, arms flailing in distinctive machine fashion and the engines in his legs revving loudly with his agitation.  
  
“We’re the class who had to deal with actual villains. They probably want to see us with their own eyes.” Bakugo walked forward, sparing a halfhearted glare to the crowd before him. “At least now they get to see what a future pro looks like. Now move it extras!  
  
“Stop calling people “extras” just because you can’t be bothered to learn their names, Katsu-shit!” exclaimed Tiffany, karate-chopping the back of the volatile blond’s head to further her point.  
  
“So, this is Class 1-A…?” A boy with unruly violet locks of hair and eyes that were heavily weighed down with tired bags moved to the forefront of the crowd.  
  
Still sitting at his desk, Itsuki’s eyes narrowed as a name came to the forefront of his mind. _Shinso…_  
  
“I heard you guys were impressive, but you sound just like an ass. Are all the students in the hero course this delusional or are you a special case?”  
  
Bakugo’s eye twitched, the other joining it at the hardly suppressed snickering from Tiffany right behind him. “Oh, he’s got you made, doesn’t he?”  
  
“Seeing something like this makes me disillusioned. There are quite a few people who enrolled in general studies or other courses because they didn’t make it into the hero course. Such is life I suppose.” Shinso sighed before looking up and meeting Bakugo’s eyes. “However, just because we didn’t cut it the first time doesn’t mean we won’t get our own second chance. If we do well enough in the sports festival, they’ll consider our transfer into the hero course and they may also transfer people out of it too.”  
  
More than a few students in Class 1-A flinched at that.  
  
Shinso still kept staring into Bakugo’s sneering face. “Scouting the competition? I came here to say that even if you’re in the hero course, if you don’t bring out everything you’ve got, I’ll sweep your feet out from under you. Consider this a declaration of war.”  
  
There was a moment of stunned silence from those present, both from within and without Class 1-A unknowingly sharing the same thought. _This guy is bold!_  
  
Save for one.  
  
“War?”  
  
Eyes turned to the one student still sitting at his desk. Itsuki faced the crowd of students at his classroom’s door, reptilian eyes narrowed dangerously, gleaming brightly in their golden hues. Twin tails shook and rattled dangerously behind him as he slowly rose to his feet.  
  
“You speak to us of arrogance… and yet here you are… You who dared to come here, to the heart of our territory and declare _war_ upon us…?”  
  
Itsuki didn’t smile. He simply revealed a gleaming mouth filled to the brim with draconic teeth.  
  
“ **Nemo me impune lacessit.** ” Itsuki uttered lowly. “You threw down the gauntlet so if you expect to survive… The next time I see you, it best be with a sword held tightly in that naked hand of yours.”  
  
“HEY YOU!” roared a boy who stood at the back of the crowd. He raised a clenched fist upwards; fanged teeth glinting only half as brightly as the metallic ridges that surrounded his eye sockets. “I’M FROM CLASS 1-B, TETSUTETSU TETSUTESU! WE HEARD YOU FOUGHT SOME VILLAINS SO I’M HERE TO SEE WHAT ALL THE HYPE IS ABOUT AND ALL I SEE IS SOME SERIOUS BULL! IF YOU’RE GONNA BE LAYING DOWN THE GAUNTLET TO ANYONE IT OUGHT TO BE US!”  
  
 _Oh jeez there’s more?!_ Izuku and Ochaco unknowingly shared the same thought and, strangely enough, the same weirded out expression. Out the corner of her eye, Tiffany saw the opportunity and discretely took a photo of the two for posterities sake. Wouldn’t do for either of them to be without any pictures of their pre-dating days. Well, that and it made for some excellent blackmail material for Izuku. The boy would pay his weight in school notes if it meant keeping any picture featuring him and any girl other than Tiffany herself away from his mother.  
  
Ignorant of the byplay occurring just a few feet to his left, Itsuki slowly turned his gaze towards Tetsutetsu who, to his immense credit, didn’t even so much as flinch from the intense scrutiny.  
  
Especially when Itsuki’s fang-filled jaw grew even wider, revealing far, far too many teeth for any human mouth to contain while golden-tinted scales erupted in a wave of reptilian hide over his human flesh. Without another word, he made his way forward and the crowd parted before him in haste until he stood towering over Tetsutetsu in his heroic guise minus of course his actual uniform.  
  
Lightning sparked between Itsuki’s fangs for a brief instant.  
  
Tetsutetsu flinched and between one blink and the next, gone was the demon and back was the human Itsuki, shaking his head as he walked away towards home. “HEY WHAT THE—GET BACK HERE AND LAY DOWN THE GAUNTLET YOU JERK!”  
  
Itsuki didn’t pause or look back. Far as he was concerned, he had bigger concerns on his mind.  
  
 _The more that things are changed, the more they stay the same…_ ** But is this for good or for ill?**  
  
 _That One saw this. I am sure of it. Where are these changes coming from? What is keeping some things the same?_ **A ripple in a pond doesn’t change the fact that it is still a pond.**  
  
 _Perhaps this is a sign… that things, no matter how bleak they may appear, could always be worse…_  
  


* * *

  
Kurogiri found himself starring upwards at a far too familiar tiled ceiling. He saw once more the same water spot in the furthest corner, a smidgeon bigger than last time he was here, and heard more than saw the tiny droplet of water impact the puddle below in the shadowed corner of the dark and dismal room.  
  
More out of habit than any actual desire of his own to escape, Kurogiri lightly flexed his arms and legs, pulling tightly upon the thick, leathered straps that bound his limbs and head to the top of the operating bed.  
  
He did not bother to try his Quirk not because he was privy to some deep, dark, and frankly impossible secrets that this room possessed. The thought never occurred to the child he had been before and thus never once entertained itself in the mind of the man he had since become.  
  
A familiar voice rasped from just beyond Kurogiri’s line of sight. “How many times must I do this to you, my dear pet project?”  
  
A faint flip of a switch and the darkened spotlight above Kurogiri’s head illuminated with an intensity to rival that of the sun. He winced, eyes closing tight both against the familiar burning of the light shining down into his retinas and the far-too-intimate touch of a gloved hand running lightly over his bare and wound-ridden chest.  
  
“There are only so many times I can take you apart and put you back together before you become disposable in my eyes, pet… I am growing tired of having my grand work interrupted because the Master’s bitch cannot act her age and insists on trying my patience.” Another hand joined the other, reaching in and peeling back a layer of skin without care to better see the burnt and scarred muscles beneath the sundered flesh. “Still… I confess I am intrigued. A mere student did this to you?”  
  
Kurogiri did not scream. For all that the boy he had been had screamed and begged and pleaded, the man he had become had since lost the will to do so some time ago. “Yes.”  
  
“Such a thing… is the sickness mutating even further?” A jab of a iron cast needle upon muscle, a faint errant spark ignited and died. “No… this is something… familiar.” Another jab, more forceful than the last but no more energy ignited within Kurogiri’s flesh. “Hmph.”  
  
For all that he did not voice his pain, Kurogiri certainly felt it still, his head woozy and spinning as a boy screamed somewhere in the back. Not that the doctor heard it.  
  
No one ever did.  
  
“Very well. I’ll have to further your augmentation but no more after this. Should you break again, my dear pet… I’m afraid there won’t be any need to put the pieces back together. The scraps can, after all, be put to so much better use.”  
  
“Very well… Doctor…”  
  
“Hmph. If the Master insists on humoring his disobedient bitch with delusions of grandeur, then it seems only fair that you do the same for me, pet.” A shadow fell slowly across Kurogiri’s face, a masked visage coming nose-to-nonexistent nose. The monster beneath the leather mask smiled unseen at their creation strapped below. Fingers dug deep into flesh and bone and with nary a twitch causing them to come undone and remade. Golden eyes gleamed with ghastly delight as alchemical energies ignited and sparked as flesh and bone and Quirks alike came apart and rejoin at the monster’s whim.  
  
“Call me Overhaul.”


End file.
